The registration of a police case against editors representing the Editors Guild of India (EGI) and the belligerent remarks of the Manipur Chief Minister, N. Biren Singh, constitute a petulant and intimidatory response to a report released by a fact-finding committee of the EGI. The report’s focus was on media coverage of the ethnic conflict that broke out early in May, and its main conclusion was that there was one-sided coverage by journalists during the conflict, but it also contained observations and conclusions indicating that the State leadership was partisan during the conflict. In a welcome move, the Supreme Court of India has given interim protection from arrest to those named in the first information report (FIR). Mr. Singh has sought to justify the filing of an FIR under sections relating to promoting enmity between two communities and wounding religious feelings by claiming that the three-member panel’s report is one-sided and may provoke further violence. However, going beyond criticising the report, he said its authors were “anti-state, anti-national and anti-establishment” and claimed that he would not have permitted them to visit the State had he known their purpose. There is no justification for such intimidatory statements even if Mr. Singh is entitled to disagree with the report. And there can be no doubt that there is no need to prosecute anyone for seeking answers and ascertaining facts about a prolonged spell of violence and conflict.
The Guild sent a team to ascertain facts in response to complaints that the media was playing a partisan role. There was also a complaint from the Indian Army too that the media coverage was “arousing passion and not letting sustainable peace come in”. Besides flagging one-sided coverage, the report also underscores that the Internet ban made matters worse and had a deleterious impact on journalism. It reveals a preference for self-censorship — so that the volatile situation was not inflamed further — and reliance on the State government for news. “This narrative under the N. Biren Singh dispensation became a narrow ethnic one playing up to the biases of the majority Meitei community,” it says. One may question whether such direct imputation of blame on the government’s leadership is needed in a report on media behaviour, but the conclusion also points to the possibility that in conflict situations, partisan or ineffective governance will be reflected in journalistic coverage too. On the wider political canvas, there appears to be no significant initiative to effect reconciliation between the two communities locked in conflict in Manipur and to bring about lasting peace. Meanwhile, it reflects poorly on the authorities if police cases are used to silence fact-finding initiatives of civil society.
