International media has been under the scanner following the Ram Mandir inauguration ceremony. The biased and false reporting of an event that marks a significant turning point in Bharatiya history, hasn’t gone unnoticed. Netizens have been raising their voices against the distorted reporting of the issue by western media. The Hindu diaspora in the west especially has been very active in terms of highlighting these biases systematically and calling out the media organizations concerned.
Hindu organizations in the west are taking the lead in highlighting the media bias in their respective countries and seeking legal remedies against the same. In Australia, the Australian Hindu Media has slammed Australian media’s distorted and biased coverage of the Ram Mandir inauguration. As per the Facebook page of Australian Hindu Media, they have also pressed for the need of Ombudsman, parliament inquiry into the specific news coverage and asked for Hindu representation on the boards of Australian media conglomerates ABC News and SBS. The Australian Hindu Media specifically calls ABC News a serial offender.
The organization has issued a press release a copy of which is posted on their Facebook page. The press release gives a detailed account of the video news story done by ABC media that distorts the facts concerning Ram Mandir inauguration. As per their press release, the ABC media story limits the history of Ayodhya to the construction of Babri Mosque in 1528, its destruction in 1992, and the building of a Hindu temple in 2024. The story makes no mention of the site’s 3,000-year-plus history and its continuous occupation by Hindus. The YouTube link to the ABC news video has also been provided in the press release of the Australian Hindu Media.
The video of the news coverage corroborates all the allegations of the Australian Hindu Media. At the beginning of the news clip itself, the news anchor talks of the Ram Mandir being built on the site of a 16th-century mosque in Ayodhya that was raised by “Hindu fundamentalists”. There is no mention of the history of Ayodhya before the construction of the Babri Mosque and the archeological evidence collected by ASI based on which the verdict came out in favour of Hindus.
The news anchor then starts lamenting about how the minorities are supposedly unhappy with this pageantry surrounding the construction of a temple in secular Bharat, and then there is a discussion on how the opposition of Bharat is also not happy with the ceremony. The video is so biased against Hindus it’s hard to watch even half of it. But I persisted and watched the whole clip. The reporter herself seems Hinduphobic. There are no sound bytes, no perspective from the Hindu side or even the Muslim side for that matter. It’s just a long piece to camera from the reporter standing in Ayodhya doling out half-truths and leveling baseless allegations against the Bharatiya government, while she chats with the anchor back in ABC News studio in probably Australia.
The anchor asks the reporter if there were any incidents of violence after the Ram Mandir inauguration ceremony. Factually speaking, not a single incident of violence has been reported following the ceremony. However, the reporter talks about some videos being circulated on social media and adds that Muslims are worried about their safety and the security of other mosques in Ayodhya. The report is as biased and Hinduphobic as one can get. It’s not just bias, it’s the case of using media as a vehicle for the propagation of plain lies. That’s why the Australian Hindu Association has done the right thing by taking this up.
The Hindu Council Australia has created a survey to get people’s feedback on the Australian media’s reporting of the Ram Mandir Pran Pratishtha ceremony. Once the findings of the survey are out, they plan to take these findings to concerned authorities in Australia like media Ombudsmen, ministers, etc.
In Canada, organizations like the Canadian Organization for Hindu Heritage Education (COHHE) are taking up the issue. Canada based media publication Toronto Star’s biased and misleading coverage of the Ram Mandir Inauguration issue has been specifically critiqued. Reporting of media conglomerates like the BBC and TIME has also been critiqued by COHHE. They have also drafted a detailed response to the Toronto Star article on Ayodhya Ram Mandir that has also been posted on their X handle. The response includes a point-by-point rebuttal of the concerned article.
Going through the Toronto Star article, one can see that the article repeats a similar pattern of distorted reporting on the Ram Mandir issue exhibited by other western media. The article says that the newly inaugurated temple has been built on the site of a razed mosque, thus skipping any mention of the history of Ayodhya before the construction of Babri Masjid and the conclusive evidence regarding the existence of a Ram Temple on the site, on the ruins of which the mosque was built by Islamic invaders. Then, it repeats the same rhetoric of the construction of the temple being supposedly antithetical to the idea of a secular India and all that. It talks about Prime Minister Modi appealing to his right-wing voter base by getting the temple constructed and all that usual rhetoric.
Hindupost has also done an earlier story on the western media bias in reporting the Ram Mandir issue in the run-up to the Pran Pratishtha ceremony. Going by their reporting of the ceremony, one can see a common template being followed in all these news reports and coverage. The trick is to limit the history of the Ram Janambhoomi site to the date of construction of Babri mosque, thus conveying the impression that the Hindu majoritarian government of Bharat got a Ram temple constructed on the site of a demolished mosque to appease the Hindu voter base of Bharat. To people who know little about Bharat or Ayodhya, the distorted news coverage indeed presents a Bharat that is intolerant and suppresses minorities.
Hindus in Ireland have reported the biased media coverage of the Ram Mandir Inauguration ceremony by Ireland-based rte news. In a major victory for Hindu Dharma and Hindus in Ireland, the rte has reportedly taken down the controversial article owing to mass reporting by Hindus.
Nivedita Ramendu Shukla, a novelist and a screenplay writer based in Ireland has posted a long X thread regarding this issue.
In the US, the issue of distorted media coverage of the Ram Mandir Inauguration ceremony has been taken up by the Coalition of Hindus of North America ( CoHNA ) who have been amplifying Hindu voices critiquing the coverage through their X Handle.
We spoke to Nikunj Trivedi, President of CoHNA who spoke of the symbolic significance of the Ram Mandir Pran Paratishthan ceremony for the Hindu diaspora in the west and critiqued the western media’s distorted coverage of the issue. “Hindus in US and Canada welcomed the Pran Pratishtha with an outpouring of joy, similar to what we saw in India, where it was celebrated by communities separated by religion, language, and ethnic barriers. The new Ram Mandir in Ayodhya is a momentous milestone – emblematic of faith and devotion as well as patience and persistence of indigenous communities. Yet, we are seeing attempts in western media to once again create controversy and obfuscate the issue, by continuously referring to the evidence as “contentious/contested”. This framing seeks to deny the legitimacy of the indigenous voices that debated the issues as well as the many institutions of the Indian state that oversaw and settled a legal battle that began in 1950. We call on media to be objective and balanced. This spread of false information also furthers Hinduphobia and threatens the well-being of diaspora Hindu communities”, he said.
INSIGHT UK has also taken an initiative on alerting Hindus to the biased media coverage of the Ram Mandir Consecration Ceremony. The organization has compiled a list of articles and news videos that have done a biased and distorted coverage of the Ram Mandir issue. It then provided detailed information on the archaeological evidence based on which the Ramjanambhoomi land was given to Hindus in the Supreme Court verdict.
The international chapters of Vishva Hindu Parishad have also raised their voice against the anti-Hindu bias in the western media reporting of Ayodhya Ram Mandir. VHP chapters in the US, Canada, and Australia have strongly condemned the biased coverage of events leading to the Pran Pratishtha ceremony by certain western media outlets. They have also demanded immediate retractions and public apologies for the same.
The VHP America has also shared a post in this regard from its official X handle. “In the aftermath of Ayodhya’s sacred Pran Pratishtha, the Western media weaves a distorted narrative. Hindus, the era of passive acceptance is over. We rise against insidiuous forces, reclaiming our narrative. In case you missed it the first time”, it says.
The image of the official press release issued by VHP America condemning biased coverage of the Ayodhya Ram Mandir is also included along with the X post.
The proactive approach taken by the Hindu diaspora in the west on reporting Hinduphobic and inaccurate western media content on the Ayodhya Ram Mandir issue sets a precedent for Hindus the world over. In Bharat, we have our very own woke media who spit venom against Hindu Dharma and Bharatiya civilization and culture casually on a routine basis. It’s high time Hindus in Bharat also become proactive in calling out anti-Hindu bias in Bharatiya media content.
On behalf of the Hindu community in Australia and across the globe, I would urge ABC TV to check their facts before showing it on prime-time news. I am appalled that a well reputed channel like ABC is showing such half-baked news. I always believed that the news readers were puppets and read what was put in front of them. But to know that even a journalist would not bother to research the story fully and show only the part that further instigates unnecessary tension between Hindus and other communities is extremely disappointing.
It was mentioned by ABC journalist, Avani Dias that this new temple for Shree Rama was built on the site of 16th century mosque after it was torn down in 1992 by Hindu mobs. However, there was no mention of what it was, prior to Babri Masjid was built. This was the birthplace of Shree Rama, one of the greatest rulers that existed thousands of years of ago. A temple constructed for this great King who followed Sathya (truth), and Dharma (cosmic divine order) existed prior to 12th century.
The exact site of Rama’s birthplace is very well documented in Skanda Purana which is a historical text not some fantasy story. The struggle to prove the birthplace of Shree Rama and reclaim what rightfully was considered as the most sacred place for Hindus has been ongoing for more than 500 years now. During this time, hundreds and thousands of Hindus including priests have been massacred by barbaric Mughals and other foreigners. Only when it was established to the satisfaction of Supreme Court bench of Justices (not jury picked randomly from public), the site was finally given to Hindus to construct a temple in 2019. It is worthwhile noting that there were over 250,000 documents and factual evidence presented to the Supreme Court.
Not only that, but the Supreme Court also ordered the government to give an alternate five acres tract of land to the Uttar Predesh Sunni Central Waqf Board to build the mosque. Again, there was no mention of any of this in their story.
Finally, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi is undoubtedly the greatest PM India has seen since its independence in 1947. Since becoming the PM, he has been constantly trying to make India a great country, not just during the election as mentioned by ABC’s journalist. And the intelligent citizens of India are no fools to blindly vote for someone just because he builds and inaugurates a temple.
They can refer to some of these links to help with their inquiry/research. I sincerely hope they will have the humility to admit that the story was incorrect and publish the correct story giving equally the same amount of time, and not just a one-line apology.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayodhya_dispute
https://youtu.be/2Y1NOgIWlIQ?si=XOBA5NtY_ozzmGXr