If, like me, you are starting to despair of Indian journalism then you’ll be pleased to know there’s good news on the horizon. Admittedly, it’s not work done for a television news channel or a newspaper. In fact, it’s a book. But it’s of the highest journalistic standards and it restores faith considerably in a profession that is losing its reputation. Today, I want to draw your attention to this book.
Called Love Jihad and Other Fictions: Simple Facts to Counter Viral Falsehoods, its authors are two former NDTV journalists, Sreenivasan Jain and Mariyam Alavi, and the executive editor of Scroll, Supriya Sharma. The “other fictions” it covers are population jihad, forced conversions, Muslim appeasement and the so-called pink revolution.
In each case, the authors present the alleged facts that purportedly substantiate these false claims and then, through meticulous research, both in the field and through media archives, debunk, if not destroy these ludicrous charges.
I want to be careful not to give away more than I should. This is a book you need to read yourself. It’s compelling and convincing. But let me whet your appetite.
On love jihad, the authors analyse a list of cases published by a special edition of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s in-house magazine. It’s “the only comprehensive documentation of love jihad”, but it’s actually just “a catalogue of 147 media reports”. The earliest entry is from November 2011. The last from September 2020.
Seventy three of these, virtually 50%, are “invalid”. They turn out to be “dead-links, repetitions, instances not related to India”. The remaining 74 turn out to be “a wide spectrum of gender-related crimes”, including fraud, abduction, abandonment, rape, and murder. “The only common feature”, the authors write, “(is) the accused was a Muslim man, the alleged victim a Hindu woman”. If the aim of love jihad is to seduce and convert Hindu women, these examples undermine the case.
The book also shows how “cow-related attacks” have increased hugely after 2014. As the authors write: “Using media archives on the internet, we counted the number of cow-related attacks across two time periods — from 2009 to 2014, the tenure of the Congress-led UPA government, and from 2014, when the first BJP-led NDA government took oath, to May 2023.”
For those who know, the results won’t be surprising. For the majority, who don’t, they’re astonishing. “We found only one instance of cow-related violence between 2009 and 2014”. In contrast, “from 2014 to May 2023, we counted 136 such cow-related attacks”. They caused 66 deaths and left 284 injured. “Of those killed, at least 70% were Muslims.”
Let me draw your attention to what the authors reveal about the spread of hate speech. Between 2009-2014, the Congress years, “we counted close to 25 instances …that number shot up to over 460 instances of VIP hate speech in the BJP years.” That’s a nine-fold jump.
It’s possible many of you don’t subscribe to the love jihad, population jihad and forced conversion myths but, perhaps, a larger number accept Muslim appeasement is happening. In that case, the chapter on that subject should be compulsory reading. The authors have literally shredded this charge. I’ll leave you to discover how effectively but I’ll tip you off to one of their conclusions. “The Hindu right has it backwards. Far from being pampered by the Congress, Muslims are at the bottom of the heap. If the Congress is guilty of anything, it is of failing to uplift Muslims despite enjoying the longest stint in power.”
Let me end with a little homily. This book should not be read by those who prefer to be blind and don’t want to see the truth. It will shatter their false illusions. But for those who genuinely care, the book is revelatory. It tells you the truth in simple, unvarnished terms that are easy to handle. I hope it’ll be equally easy to accept.
Karan Thapar is the author of Devil’s Advocate: The Untold Story. The views expressed are personal
Karan Thapar is a super-looking genius who’s young, friendly, chatty and great fun to be with. He’s also very enjoyable to read. ...view detail
Debunking propaganda myths, restoring truths
12
1
28.01.2024
If, like me, you are starting to despair of Indian journalism then you’ll be pleased to know there’s good news on the horizon. Admittedly, it’s not work done for a television news channel or a newspaper. In fact, it’s a book. But it’s of the highest journalistic standards and it restores faith considerably in a profession that is losing its reputation. Today, I want to draw your attention to this book.
Called Love Jihad and Other Fictions: Simple Facts to Counter Viral Falsehoods, its authors are two former NDTV journalists, Sreenivasan Jain and Mariyam Alavi, and the executive editor of Scroll, Supriya Sharma. The “other fictions” it covers are population jihad, forced conversions, Muslim appeasement and the so-called pink revolution.
In each case, the authors present the alleged facts that purportedly substantiate these false claims and then, through meticulous research, both in the field and through media archives, debunk, if not destroy these ludicrous charges.
I want to be careful not to give away more than I should. This is a........
© hindustantimes
visit website
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Tarik Cyril Amar
Rami G Khouri
Dr Ramzy Baroud
Mort Laitner
Bradley Blankenship
Michael Kwet
