Anything learned from 26/11?

For 15 months, India was spared terror strikes. All that changed on the night of February 13, when a bomb was planted in Pune’s popular German Bakery. In the ensuing blast, nine people were killed, including three foreigners – an Italian, an Iranian and a Nepali. Oddly many newspapers only wrote about two foreigners, failing to recognise that the Nepali too was a foreigner.

In the time gap between the terror strike in Mumbai on November 26, 2008 and February 13, 2010, much has been written about the role of the media and its coverage of the over 60 hours when 10 terrorists held the attention of the entire nation. News channels, in particular, came in for a great deal of criticism for their coverage during and after the terror strike. The jingoistic tone of some channels, notably Times Now, after the terror attack was noted including the way in which its anchors egged studio guests to agree that India should strike back at Pakistan. The media spilled over with pseudo-nationalism and anger against Pakistan. Any attempts to introduce some nuance, to point out the difference between the people of Pakistan and the government, and the difference between Jehadi elements in Pakistan and the government, were shouted down.

Barring a few exceptions, there was a disturbing uniformity in the tone of the media in the days after 26/11. The criticism, however, did not go unheeded. Although there was some defensiveness, several television journalists acknowledged that perhaps they had crossed the line.

It was also evident that the authorities had failed in the way they dealt with the media. In Mumbai, there was no clear centre of authority. Media persons ran from person to person getting quotes, all of them aired in real time. None of this helped create a sense of reassurance or confidence in the public.

After the Pune blast, there was much self-congratulation by the central government and the Maharashtra government on how well they reacted to the tragedy compared to 26/11. Some of this was true. Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan was available to the media, as was Union Home Secretary Pillai in Delhi. Home Minister P. Chidambaram visited Pune within less than 24 hours of the incident. The media were briefed by those given the authority to speak.

Yet, even this time, there was chaos in the immediate aftermath. For one, television footage depicted police, journalists and the public stomping all over the devastated site, unmindful of the fact that they might be destroying important forensic evidence. The Pune police was clearly unprepared or not briefed on how to deal with such a situation. In any other country, such areas are immediately cordoned off. It will be recalled, that in Mumbai on November 29, when the last terrorist had been gunned down at the Taj Mahal Hotel, the electronic media went berserk, trampling over broken glass, pushing their way into the hotel and even holding up burnt curtains to show viewers the damage inside. Then too the authorities failed to prevent anyone, particularly the media, from entering the battle-scarred hotel.

But even if in these instances the authorities could be faulted, has the media learned anything since 26/11 about its own responsibility during and after such events?

Perhaps not. After 26/11 there was wholesale speculation about who was responsible for the terror attack even before the government could make a definite statement. This time again, the government has been careful to say that all facts must be checked before anything definitive can be stated. Yet, the media has already made up its mind. Here’s a sample of front-page headlines from four Mumbai-based multi-edition newspapers on February 15:

The Times of India: Blast Part of LeT’s Karachi Project? Hand of Indian Mujahideen seen all over

Hindustan Times: Directed by LeT, executed by IM?

The story goes on to quote a ‘senior security official’: “It looks like a combined effort, commanded by the LeT leadership in Pakistan and executed by IM sleeper cells. US citizen David Headley is the man Lashkar used for the recce.”

DNA: Finger points to LeT-backed IM: Govt fears serial attacks

It would appear that the same ‘senior security official’ briefed all three newspapers. So what should newspapers do with such information? Run it with attribution somewhere in the paper or play it up on the front-page even before the forensic evidence has been collected and analysed?

One would have thought that after 26/11, the media had decided to err on the side of caution. But that was then. Clearly, today is another day and we are back to the principle of competition and the best strategy to capture eyeballs and sell newspapers.

Only Indian Express struck a different note with its headline: Govt. decides, terror won’t hit talks with Pak. View is knee-jerk reactions don’t help, priorities may be changed later

The second issue in the aftermath of terror attacks is sensitivity, especially when speaking to survivors or the families of those who died. Within an hour of the blast, television cameras were hounding the wounded being wheeled into hospitals. We saw undignified shots of people, some with their clothes torn off, struggling to maintain some dignity in the face of a battery of lights and camera. TV crews tracked down the families of those who had died and as usual tried to get statements despite appeals from these families that they be left alone to grieve in private. Finally the Pune police chief had to intervene and issue a directive asking media not to harass the wounded in the hospitals. No lessons learned here either.

(The Hoot, Feb 15, 2010)

(See also more detailed analysis on Infochange: http://infochangeindia.org/Media/Related-Analysis/Confused-coverage-damaged-credibility.html)

26/11 and all that anger

The little girl selling candles outside the Taj Mahal hotel was having the best time on November 26. No one quibbled when she asked for Rs. 10 for each candle. All kinds of Mumbaikars bought candles from her and others like her, and lit them ritualistically outside the hotel. Every now and then they would pause as they noticed one of hundreds of photographers positioning themselves to take the definitive picture of Mumbai in mourning a year after the terror attack.

While several thousands of Mumbai’s residents thronged the area in front of the Taj, a virtual wall made up of vehicles with generators separated them from another ceremony on the other side of the plaza around the Gateway of India. This was the VIP mourning session. The aam admi was kept out and Mumbai’s police were tasked with the job of ensuring that this distance between the important and the unimportant remain intact.

The November 26 anniversary in Mumbai was a spectacle in more ways that one. The candle lighting was predictable. Since the Jessica Lal murder case and Rang de Basanti, this form of remembrance, magnified by the electronic media, has now become a virtual norm. But the anniversary went beyond that.

The city seemed to be under siege again, or at least its southern part, as streams of important people went from one location to another paying homage to the dead while the police waved their hands and blew whistles to keep the roads clear for them. Earlier in the morning the flag march by the Mumbai police, when a part of the busy Marine Drive was blocked off at peak traffic time, failed to either awe or to reassure Mumbai’s harried citizens.

Omnipresent at every location was the OB van and dozens of journalists and cameramen. The media circus was on full display and was as much an object of interest as the events. Assorted groups with their own agendas used the presence of the media to put forward their messages. So a group from the BJP shouted slogans like “Phansi do, phansi do” demanding that the lone surviving terrorist Ajmal Kasab be hanged. The Hare Rama Hare Krishna brigade sang bhajans and danced around. An old poster, created after the 1992-93 communal riots by a garment manufacturer in Dharavi, the late Waqar Younis, showing four young boys depicting four different religions under the slogan “Ham Sab Ek Hain” was held up by a woman accompanied by a young man with a cutout of India and a national flag. Within minutes a crowd had gathered around them. And so on. It was a mela of personal messages and agendas. And somewhere in the background was the memory that a year ago the structure before which all this was happening had been under siege in one of the most spectacular terror attacks seen in India.

The odd slogans apart, what one did not sense was any anger. Disappointment, yes. But not anger. Not of the kind expressed a year back. So what had happened? Had people changed? Or had the anger drummed up at that time subsided because it had not been channeled into anything constructive? Of course, if you believed what you heard on television, Mumbaikars apparently were angry. Some of the talking heads on TV—the famous and the glamorous – declared repeatedly that they were angry and fed-up with the government and the political class.

Strikingly, those who said they were not angry were people who were still grieving a personal loss. People like Ragini Sharma, the wife of a ticket collector who was shot down at CST station. Or journalist Sabina Sehgal Saikia’s brother, who suggested that people needed to move on beyond anger.

Unfortunately, Mumbaikars have not moved on beyond anger or disappointment to any kind of engagement or effort to change the system. Venting is the easiest form of expression and the electronic media, in particular, now gives the famous and the ordinary a chance to do just that. But what is achieved at the end of all that except an accumulation of hot air?

In the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year, one person did attempt to engage with the system. Banker Meera Sanyal stood for elections as an independent candidate in the sincere belief that the anger expressed following November 26 would translate into votes for someone like her. Nothing of the kind happened. Her supporters deluded themselves up to the last minute. Ms Sanyal lost her deposit. Ms Sanyal has to be saluted for at least taking this step but have those who convinced themselves that she would win because she echoed the sentiments of people upset about the events of last November understood why she lost?

The elite and the middle class in a city like Mumbai are convinced that if they speak, the rulers must listen. So if they shout and say they are angry, those in power should shake in trepidation and immediately set about making changes. If they ask questions like “Why didn’t the NSG use tear gas in the Taj while tackling the terrorists?” they must be given a studied response even though the question arises from complete ignorance about how such situations are handled.

In between such questions being raised on prime time television, there is little or no engagement with the realities of the city. Some are engaged – and they are always the people who speak some sense. But their numbers are few, not enough to make a dent in the city’s development plans, to break the growing and obvious nexus between builders and politicians, to impact the course of decision-making on issues vital to people’s daily existence. The few exceptions are where people have decided not to sit back and protest but to organise and resist. Thus the residents of Gorai in northwest Mumbai, for instance, successfully prevented land acquisition for an SEZ that would have destroyed the lives and livelihood of thousands of fisherfolk and farmers. But apart from a handful of such examples of successful interventions in changing policy, Mumbaikars continue to demonstrate amazing indifference to their surroundings and only wake up periodically when disasters hit them – a flood, a bomb blast or a terror attack.

The problem with the hype around anniversaries like November 26 is that it is only hype. When anger does not lead to constructive engagement, not only does it dissipate but it also serves no purpose. If there is anything we should learn a year after November 26, it is this, a truth that has been self-evident for decades in this city.

(Also read my column on The Hoot on the media and 26/11 --http://www.thehoot.org/web/home/story.php?storyid=4230&mod=1&pg=1&sectionId=10&valid=true)