Arnab Goswami’s Republic TV, India Today and TV9 Bharatvarsh had run fake news about Afghanistan in the past, due to which they are now facing embarrassment at the international level. Social media users are giving their reactions fiercely criticizing these two Indian TV channels.
Their dubious coverage on Afghanistan was exposed on a French News channel, how these Indian channels spread fake news. Responding to their fake news on the fighting in Afghanistan’s Panjshir Valley, a prominent presenter of French TV channel ‘France 24’ said, “These people are giving journalists a sinister name. Absolutely terrible stuff.”
In a video clip going viral on social media, two journalists from ‘France 24’ can be seen discussing the fake news run by Republic TV, India Today and TV9 Bharatvarsh on the recent war in Afghanistan. In a video Republic TV was seen broadcasting fake footage of drone strikes from Afghanistan, the channel claimed that the Pakistani Air Force was carrying out strikes in the Panjshir Valley and it was the same video. But, those scenes were actually taken from a video game.
The video was shown by Republic TV with the headline, “Source: Pak army fighting on behalf of Taliban.” Another headline of Arnab Goswami’s TV channel on the video reads, “Pak Air Force attacked Panjshir.” Republic TV had aired a video of an Afghan expatriate TV channel ‘Hasti TV’ (a news channel from Afghanistan) broadcast from Britain as ‘exclusive’. Republic TV used the scenes without verifying their authenticity.
A France 24 journalist highlighted how TV9 Bharatvarsh used the same scene from a video game last year to claim they were fighter jets attacking Azerbaijani jets from Armenia. Stunned by the threat of fake news on Indian TV channels, the France 24 presenter said, “Glory be.”
The reporter said, “The worst fact-finding hour goes to TV9 Bharatvarsh. They circulated those images the same way other networks did. But they circulated the same pictures last year and this time they said that Armenia shot down Azerbaijan jets.”
Significantly, last month several Indian TV channels including Republic TV, India Today, Times Now and TV9 Bharatvarsh faced widespread condemnation on social media for airing fake videos. TV channels claimed that the Taliban, along with Pakistan, carried out airstrikes on local fighters. Ever since the Taliban claimed to have captured Panjshir, several Indian media organizations claimed that Pakistan was in support of the Taliban.