Shams Ur Rehman Alavi
Media houses that take up active role in case of inter-religious marriages when groom is Muslim & create havoc with inflammatory reports, suddenly turn liberal when a Hindu man marries a Muslim girl & term it 'breaking shackles of religion.
These are clear double standards. They hail any marriage in which a Muslim girl marries a Hindu man, but if a Muslim man marries a Hindu girl, it is termed 'Love Jihad' and there is not just strong condemnation but law misused to target the couple.
This is exactly the stand of the far right-wing that was termed 'fringe' till now, as they considered it a sort of 'victory'. However, media houses too follow the same strategy and this is something that needs to be understood.
Above, the news reports show two instances of inter-faith marriages in two states, published in different Hindi papers. In both the cases, Muslim girls married Hindu boys through Hindu rituals. And, the papers praise the act.
In case, groom is Muslim, papers create so much hatred using the word 'Love Jihad' that not just groom, his family also suffers. Either you support all inter-faith marriages or none. Here, Hindi papers become 'Hindu papers', who write in order to send the message to the society that Hindus should bring Muslim brides and if a Muslim groom gets a Hindu bride, they ought to be punished.
Here, journalists take up the role of agents of right-wing and wear identity and religion on their sleeve. They are not journalists, they are not just some unethical people or involved in false reporting. In fact, they have been preparing the ground for fascists to take over the society, by dividing people.
It is media, many journalists in these newsrooms who work as mercenaries of hate and spread poison in society. It is they who are responsible for communalism & hate that results in assaults, false cases, lives getting lost.
And, it doesn't stop at marriages. For decades, they have been injecting this slow poison from newsrooms--injecting communalism, hate, distrust of other community, and doing their job with zealousness & doing it cleverly. In ordinary reports, not easy to spot how twists are given.
They have innumerable ideas, if 'Love Jihad' propaganda gets a bit too much to handle, they will come with another. The problem is this level of indoctrination that makes 'journos' misuse their power to spread hate, put harmony of country at stake, is ignored.
Every story gets twisted, based on these biases. This is the gutter level to which Indian Journalism has fallen into. They will never share data, statistics, just mislead society. There was one radio station in Rwanda, but we've innumerable media houses, packed with such people peddling this agenda of hate, under the garb of 'journalism'.
READ: How newspapers, TV channels in India create the bogey of 'Love Jihad'