Many countries in Europe are in the grip of farmers’ protests. According to media reports, farmers in Germany, France, Poland, and Romania have been holding protests for the past couple of weeks. In Germany, the farmers have been protesting the government’s plans to cut agricultural subsidies to curb rising inflation. Farmers in France are reportedly protesting over multiple issues including government tax on tractor fuels, increasing competition from cheap imports, water storage issues, price pressures from retailers, etc. As European countries struggle with rising inflation in the aftermath of the Russia-Ukraine war, they are contemplating tough measures to get the economy back on track. This is facing a backlash from the agricultural workers in these countries.
What is of interest to us though here is the western media’s diametrically opposite standards and ethics when it comes to reporting on protests being held in western countries and protests held in Bharat. Going through the reporting of farmers’ protests that have engulfed Europe, most news reports take either a pro-government or objective (which is how journalism should be) stance. None of the news reports covering these protests sensationalize or dramatize the protests or the issues faced by farmers. “Germany’s far right seek revolution in farmers’ protests”, “Thousands of tractors block Berlin as farmers protest over fuel subsidy cuts”, “EU farmer protests: What’s driving tractors to the streets”? “Daily Review: European Farmers’ Protests spread to France”. As you can see, these are straightforward headlines and there is no controversy or the farmer vs government angle being manufactured at the outset, which is done so generously in the western media’s coverage of protests and demonstrations in Bharat.
Contrast this with the media coverage of farmers’ protests held in Bharat. “Confronting State Violence: Lessons from India’s Farmer Protests”, “Violence Strikes and India’s Farmers want you to see it”, “Explainer: How Indian farmers’ protest turned into a country-wide movement”, “The Farmers’ Protests are a Turning Point for India”, “India cuts internet around New Delhi as protesting farmers clash with police”, “ India’s farmers are protesting authoritarianism disguised as capitalism. Sounds Familiar”, these are a few samples of dramatic and provocative titles of news and academic articles published regarding Bharat’s farmer protests’ during 2020-21 in leading western media publications and think tanks.
When the likes of The New York Times, BBC, CNN, The Guardian, etc. report on protests in Bharat, the Bharatiya government is portrayed as authoritarian and the protestors are depicted as some sort of revolutionaries heralding a social revolution. The whole issue is taken out of context, blown out of proportions, and perhaps exoticized and dramatized for an international audience. However, when it comes to protests happening in western countries, the western media often adopts a pro-government approach subtly suggesting protestors are disrupting law and order and it’s simply not worth it. The flippancy, over-the-top-dramatic histrionics, and the anti-capitalist revolutionary tone that the western media flaunts in its coverage of protests in developing countries like Bharat, is totally missing in its coverage of affairs back home. Or is that special tone and style specially reserved for the “third-world countries”?
One can see an interesting pattern in the western media coverage of farmers’ protests in Europe. Most of the news either subtly or overtly tries to discredit these protests by suggesting these are being fuelled by extreme right-wing parties. A recent news article published by BBC on farmers’ protests in Germany titled “Germany’s far right seek revolution in farmers’ protests” does this rather overtly. “Far-right groups have discussed toppling the German government as they seek to harness the anger of ongoing farmer protests over subsidy cuts”, says the article in the beginning itself. The article further says there have been reports of neo-Nazi or monarchist groups turning up at rallies. The entire news report seems to want to create an impression that the farmers’ protests in Germany have been hijacked by far-right groups who have hatched a conspiracy to topple the government. After ostensibly providing a plethora of evidence to prove the far-right link of the protests, the article plays dilly-dally in a spectacle of journalistic neutrality, “ And while there’s little evidence that the far-right has fully managed to hijack the ongoing farmers’ protests, it’s also clear that broader discontent – about issues like inflation and globalization – is being absorbed into an agricultural movement that is simultaneously energizing Germany’s political extremes”, says the article towards the end.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67976889
When protests held in Bharat, be it the farmers’ protests or the anti-CAA protests are hijacked by all sorts of anti-national actors and far left radical groups, the likes of BBC don’t see any problem with that. But when it comes to protests in Europe, they lament the apparent hijacking of these protests by far-right radical groups. Hypocrisy indeed! The western media coverage of protests in Bharat rather glorifies all sorts of actors antagonistic towards the state and becomes a champion of their “rights”. It doesn’t see the farmers’ protests in Bharat for what it is – an agricultural movement unlike how it views the farmers’ protests in Europe. The farmers’ protests in Bharat were initially an agricultural movement hijacked by all sorts of anti-Bharat forces to peddle propaganda against the Bharatiya government. The western media supported them fully in this endeavor by carrying sensational news stories of Bharat’s democracy being in danger as the protestors were being mishandled, their freedom of expression was being curtailed, etc.
Similarly, the anti-CAA protests held in Bharat were covered majorly by the western media through a biased anti-Bharatiya government lens. Most news reports of that time created the impression that CAA discriminated against Bharatiya Muslims which is a bunch of lies. CAA was meant to make it easier for persecuted minorities in countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh to get citizenship in Bharat. How does that become discriminatory against Bharatiya Muslims? But the western media ran a vitriolic propaganda campaign against the Bharatiya state by doing superficial and one-sided coverage of the anti-CAA protests further fuelling the impression that the Bharatiya state was oppressing the minorities.
German broadcaster Deutsche Welle did a piece on farmers’ protests in Europe in the beginning of January. The article titled “EU Farmer protests: What’s driving tractors to the streets?” says that “Similar demonstrations, marked in some instances by violence and pointed encroachment into politicians’ private sphere, have at times caused huge shutdowns in the Netherlands in the last few years”. Can you imagine a western media report on protests in Bharat talking about encroachment into the private sphere of politicians with such sensitivity? The very thought of it seems hilarious. It certainly seems the western media has a different set of journalism ethics and guidelines for reporting on Bharat and reporting on western countries.
https://www.dw.com/en/eu-farmer-protests-whats-driving-tractors-to-the-streets/a-67941730
The Canadian government’s brutal crackdown on truckers’ protests during the time of Covid-19 in 2022 is perhaps still fresh in public memory. During that time, thousands of protestors clogged the streets of Ottawa and besieged Parliament Hill, demonstrating against the vaccine mandate for truckers and other covid restrictions, thus condemning Justin Trudeau’s government.
Trudeau had invoked Canada’s federal emergency laws to put an end to the protests. It was reportedly for the first time in 50 years that these emergency provisions were invoked. The emergency powers allowed the Trudeau government to impose bans on public assembly in certain areas and to prohibit travel to protest zones. The bank accounts of the leading demonstrators were also frozen as part of these measures.
A criminal trial also opened up in September 2023 for the two Canadians who were the key organizers of the protest. Now, the Federal Court of Canada has ruled that Trudeau’s decision to use emergency legislation to quell the truckers’ protests was not justified.
The point is one didn’t witness any global media outrage over Canada’s handling of the truckers’ protests in 2022. One didn’t see any western media reports condemning the “human rights abuses” of the Justin Trudeau government as they invoked emergency measures against the protestors. Imagine if such a scenario had happened in Bharat. The whole western media machinery would have gone into overdrive mode.
During Covid time, every small instance of opposition parties peddling conspiracy theories against the Bharat made covid vaccine, or a bunch of people having doubts about its efficacy, was blown out of proportion by the western media to showcase Bharat’s apparent incompetency in developing a decent covid vaccine. But when it came to people protesting against covid restrictions in western countries, same media went into a hush-hush mode. Far more people protested against COVID-19 lockdowns and other restrictive measures in western countries than they ever did in Bharat. But the western media was busy sensationalizing the overcrowding of burial grounds in Bharat.
The western media’s biased coverage of Ayodhya Ram Mandir Pran Pratishtha ceremony didn’t go very well with the netizens. Many netizens voiced their opinions on social media regarding its one-sided coverage of the issue and its omission of the history of the land on which the Babri Masjid was built, and the archaeological evidence based on which the Supreme Court gave the ruling in favor of Hindus.
The point is Bharatiyas can now see through the sham of mainstream western media when it comes to reporting on Bharat. It’s high time the western media comes out of its colonial hangover and reports on issues related to Bharat from a balanced and objective lens.
