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After the Storm
By M. Zeyaul Haque
Throughout the fortnight of anti-Muslim hysteria and orgy
of Qur'an-burning, ‘national’ media’s attitude left a lot to be desired
 No
sooner than the ‘national’ media’s brouhaha over the Bamiyan episode
had begun to taper off to a less shrill—but sufficiently consistent ---
crescendo of condemnation of ‘Islamic fundamentalism’ Hindu
fundamentalists in Delhi took it upon themselves to ‘avenge’ a cousin
faith’s humiliation in Afghanistan. The method they chose was in tune
with their earlier antics – they would not go to Afghanistan to avenge
the demolition of the Buddha statues. They would not even think of
touching the Taliban, forget about fighting them. They would try to
humiliate Indian Muslims who had no role to play in Bamiyan.
The same media which was beside itself with righteous indignation at the
destruction of the Bamiyan Buddha, chose to ignore the episode and turned
a Nelson’s eye to the grievous misdemeanour, an act which in no way was
less sacrilegious than the Bamiyan episode.
As copy after copy of the holy book was torched in Delhi, Amritsar and
Patiala, the media went on parroting the foolish cliché ‘alleged
burning of the Qur'an.’ The sacrilege remained a mere allegation for the
media even though the accomplished fact of the burning began to be
reported in the same newspapers.
The self-proclaimed champions of freedom of expression, Aaj Tak TV and its
parent company publications, refused to be woken from self-hypnosis. Aaj
Tak went on parroting the hackneyed phrase ‘Qur'an jalane ke afwahon ko
lekar hinsa’ (violence over rumours of Qur'an burning).
For this credulous media outfit which took the police versions of Kanpur
riots as a gospel truth, the Qur'an burning remained an afwah till the end
of the self-created Hindutva hysteria.
Even the more level-headed publications like The Hindu could not resist
the temptation of empty pontification. In an editorial on March 21
(‘Violence in Kanpur’), this liberal newspaper, which happens to be a
favourite of many Indian Muslims, remarked that Muslims in Kanpur had gone
on a rampage on a mere ‘rumour’ of Qur'an-burning. Strangely, the same
media which ignored the original event of Qur'an burning in Delhi by a
group of 200 Hindutva activists right before policemen and intelligence
people, chose to focus on its fall out in Kanpur because it gave it the
opportunity to comment adversely on Islam and Muslims. The entire debate
was shifted to alleged Muslim intolerance, leaving aside the original
provocation in Delhi.
As police pounced upon Muslims in Kanpur, the state remained a mute
spectator in Delhi, Amritsar and Patiala. Nobody was prevented from
mischief.
Then came the season of media’s holier-than-thou utterances. India Today
tried to show that SIMI was some kind of a Muslim RSS, while The Statesman
observed pedantically in its first edit on March 29: ‘One radicalism
feeds on the other.’ Thus the aggressor and the victim – the Qur'an-burners
and Indian Muslims – were equated.
Another liberal newspaper, which is highly respected by many Muslims,
ended up equating the aggressor with the victim in its first edit on March
26. The revered leader writer of The Indian Express observed
magisterially: ‘The Vishwa Hindu Parishad, for instance, dismissed
reports of the burning of the Koran as ‘rumour mongering by Islamic
fundamentalists’. The VHP will never know it, but its mindset and
strategies are almost a mirror image of that of the Islamic
fundamentalists.’
All said and done, the media was obsessed with ‘Islamic
fundamentalism’, adamantly refusing to admit that it was not ‘Islamic
fundamentalism’ in the first place that had treated us to the horror
show in Delhi, Amritsar and Patiala. The protests and demonstrations that
followed in Kanpur, Srinagar, Pune and Aurangabad (besides the
neighbouring countries) were only in response to the acts of sacrilege.
They were not the primary events. Hence, they were not the handiwork of
‘Islamic fundamentalists’, the media’s whipping boys, but Hindu
fundamentalists. Thus the entire discourse was off-key, grossly distorted
and unconvincing. The media refused to be disabused of its obsession with
Islamic fundamentalism even after a man entered a Kolkatta mosque, lifted
a copy of the holy book from a shelf, tore off some pages, and flung it on
the floor. (The Bengal CM said he was a ‘mad’ man.)
There are quite a few questions that media should have raised, but did
not. For instance, is it plausible and natural for some people in India to
get so offended with a sacrilegious act in another country that they fail
to restrain themselves and go on a Qur'an-burning spree? Is there a
justification for one religious group taking offence against a second
group about a sacrilege against a third group?
The Taliban had offended people of good sense worldwide, but by no stretch
of imagination the Bamiyan destruction can be interpreted as an anti-Hindu
act. No Buddhist country burnt the Qur'an. The point is that a Muslim
group had offended Buddhist sentiments, but the Hindu fundamentalists, who
had no reason to be provoked, attacked the Qur'an.
Now, if we believe the media’s stories of ‘Islamic fundamentalism’
and VHP being ‘the mirror image of the Islamic fundamentalist’, how
many cases of scripture burning have been reported from South Asia in
response to the heroic act of Qur'an burning? Muslims have been deeply
offended all over the world, but they are not certainly the ‘mirror
image’ of the VHP, not even the fundamentalist Muslims. Did any
‘fundamentalist’ Muslim in Pakistan, Bangladesh or Afghanistan burn
any scripture?
To sum up, one would wish that somehow our media disabuse itself of its
pet cliches and started looking at Muslims and Islam in a more reasonable,
balanced manner. If it does not do that, it would go on being tormented by
the ghosts of its own creation. Ghosts like Islamic fundamentalists, for
instance. q |
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