A #thread on the media reporting on Kashmir, that we tried to cover in Asia Times last week. We made an interesting discovery, particularly about the BBC and its reporting in Soutj Asia.
We have seen how sharply divided the reporting in India and abroad has been. While many Indian media houses have been criticised (rightly so, in my opinion) about becoming govt mouthpieces, not enough has been examined about the role of the "foreign media" like the BBC
And this is what we found. When it comes to terror attacks, the BBC has a dual approach. If the attack is in the UK, then their reporting clearly labels it as a "terror attack".
Eg A report on compensation-related issues after a "terror attack"
bbc.com/news/uk-492512…
But when it comes to reporting terror attacks in India, terrorists become "gunmen" and/or "armed groups/militants" etc.
Example, a report after the #Pulwama attack on Feb, 2019
Note the absence of terrorism or terror.
bbc.com/news/world-asi…
Similarly, the terror attacks/bombings in Sri Lanka earlier this year also had the words "terror" and "terrorism" missing
bbc.com/news/world-asi…
As part of our journalism process, we sent a detailed questionnaire to the BBC along with these embedded link seeking their comment.
They declined to respond to these specific questions and only have a boiler plate response that didn't address any of our queries.
When we sent a reminder that none of our specific queries have been responded to, they said that
"We have nothing more to add to our statement."
This surprised us, because as a media organisation, this is how governments/corporates always fob off uncomfortable queries.
This raises questions about the quality of reporting and the use of semantics selectively. One standard for the UK and another for South Asia.
Surprising, because the BBC has a large Indian staff who report in various languages in India.
In our questionnaire to the BBC we also asked them questions on how they view the instrument of accession signed by Maharaja Hari Singh and how it is viewed in the BBC's editorial standards and how it reflects their reporting.
They didn't respond.
Here are two more examples of using the word "terror" when they report on attacks in the UK
Example # 1
bbc.com/news/uk-politi…
Example # 2
bbc.com/news/uk-393639…
But see what the BBC'S editorial guidelines have to say about the use of "terror" or "terrorism"
bbc.com/editorialguide…
And yet, they freely use these terms (as shown in the tweet above) when reporting similar attacks in the UK
However, our reporting didn't find any such discrimination in other international media organisations like NYT, Guardian, WashPo etc
They are quite consistent with usage as well as semantics.
Share this Scrolly Tale with your friends.
A Scrolly Tale is a new way to read Twitter threads with a more visually immersive experience.
Discover more beautiful Scrolly Tales like this.