BLUNT BUTCHER
JAMMU: Some Burhan Wani of South Kashmir has now become a new terror phenomenon in the Valley, courtesy overzealous media. Glorified as ‘top commander’ and ‘icon for the Kashmiri youth’, a section of media is willingly projecting him larger than life size while others are falling in the trap of invisible ‘smart guys’, charged with responsibility of image building of terror regime at the behest of state and non-state actors from across the border. Those attempting to even ‘demonise’ terror symbols like Burhan are in turn glamourising them by providing much needed oxygen in terms of publicity. It is not only Burhan, who owes his ‘high profile image’ to media flare up; Bhindrawale and Afzal Guru too had a high voltage media backup that made them what they remain even after their deaths.
Getting projected as a poster boy of new age terrorism, Burhan has got adequate media build up ever since the release of his first video message on 26th August 2015. Since then the traditional and social media is agog with reports on his terror adventures. He is being highlighted to the extent of heroism, notwithstanding public admission of Hizbul Mujahideen in recent killing of police personnel across the Valley.
Kashmir has witnessed terrorism getting glamourised in early nineties when myths were created around entities like ‘General Moosa’, ‘Air Marshal Noor Khan’ , so on and so-forth. Who doesn’t know how terror activities and terror inflictors got adequately covered in the local and national media. There were times when ‘jihadis’ used to get funds from Pakistan only after their activities getting widely covered. In the process, they became dreaded names among their possible victims and Mujahids among those who believed terror as means to achieve political objectives. In both the cases, it was win-win situation for terrorists to remain under media focus. Of course, a section of media also flourished by terrorism becoming an organised enterprise in the Valley.
British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had aptly described publicity as oxygen for terrorists. Addressing American Bar Association in 1985, she had said, “We must try to find ways to starve the terrorist of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend. In our societies we do not believe in constraining the media, still less in censorship. But ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, a code under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists’ morale or their cause while the hijack lasted?”
Isn’t media going overboard in highlighting terrorists and terror activities in Kashmir? But for the media flare up, who would have known what Burhan Wani stated in his video message about Jammu and Kashmir Police remaining ‘compulsory’ target of his outfit or the plans of terror outfits against so-called Sainik and Pandit colonies? The media has gone in detail about his dress code and the circumstances leading to his joining terror ranks when a teenager.
The media must exercise self-restraint in providing oxygen to terrorists and terrorism. It should not be forgotten that terror is a monster that ultimately eats up vitals of its mentors. William Shakespeare had said it best in Macbeth: “That we but teach bloody instructions, which, being taught, return to plague the inventor.” By giving extraordinary coverage and holding debates in national television channels, the terrorists have got what they craved for. They needed to get noticed which media provided them in a platter.
Ushy Mohan Dass, an avid writer and academician, has rightly pointed out that “The media should have a conscious sense of its responsibilities to the public, as one of the goals of terrorists is to shake public confidence in their own security. Thus, objectivity and bipartisanship should be key when reporting an episode so that the viewers can make their own opinion of the incident independent of the media’s influence”.
On the contrary, in the case of Burhan Wani, the media has gone hysteric in highlighting what he stated. Apart from print media, both in the State and outside the State, the national electronic channels spared much of their air-time in disseminating the terror message. This is what the perpetrators and masters beyond the borders had wished. The very purpose of video recording a message intended to be disseminated widely and the media did it much to the amusement and satisfaction of planners. The purpose is solved. Now it is for media to ponder whether they have performed their professional obligations or fallen in the trap of terror masters. Choices were there but most of the media preferred to become tool in the hands of terror merchants.
