Is Indian media a bit too Nationalist?

Nationalism, Anti-Nationalism, Nationalist, Anti-Nationalist- These are some combination of words that are echoing during the Prime Time hours in IST.

So what are these words?

Well, without taking a lot of time- the word nationalism is simply being loyal towards your country and respecting it no matter what and a person who practices it turns out to be a Nationalist. By prefixing *ANTI* to it, the words become the acronyms.

Following the unfortunate incidents over past few years from the Kashmir valley to the top-notch universities of India- a spark of Nationalism and Anti-nationalism broke out and the media addressed the issue with a serious concern and alike every time, in what could be an unfortunate situation for what is called the ‘Fourth Pillar of Democracy’, it got divided into two.

The division went beyond Left and Right, this time the severance is on the basis of Nationalist and Anti-nationalist.

This channel is nationalist, this newspaper is Anti-nationalist- these kind of statements have become quite common these days. Unfortunately, if a media organisation is trying showcasing the other side of the coin, then they are likely to be called as Anti-national or Anti-nationalist.

While, turning the coin around to the ‘too much nationalism in media’- Well, there is nothing called ‘too much nationalism or too much nationalist’. The science is not that evolved to invent a device that could measure nationalism in an individual. Thus, there is no point of any media being ‘too nationalist’.

Nationalism is something that comes from within and just preaching doesn’t justify/prove nationalism among the people. It’s the deeds that classify it.

For Example: Imagine there are two persons-

– One of them stands on the national anthem, talks of killing enemies, tries to stop anyone who speaks against the country, shares patriotic posts on social media, but at the same time evade taxes and exploit public utilities.

-While on the other side there is a person who doesn’t do above-mentioned things but focus on his/her ambitions, pay taxes and think how to make the country and himself/herself proud.

So you can decide who the true nationalist is.

The media in India seems to have diverted from the core principle of journalism i.e to Inform and educate and let the people decide which way to choose. On the contrary, in case of Indian media- the bottom line seems to be pre-decided and the debate happens around it portraying the opposing side wrong.

The most recent victim of the same is the prestigious JNU. Following the most unfortunate incidents that took place on the campus of Jawaharlal Nehru University, because of some ill-elements in the campus and wrongly practised journalism- the image of one of India’s esteemed universities was tarnished so badly that young students started denying getting into the university.

Unlike mainstream media, it won’t be the bottom line, but the possibility is- “the Indian media might not be ‘too nationalist’ but driven by multiple/unknown forces.”

• Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
• Share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)