‘Shaheen Bagh’, ‘land jihad’: Another year, another ‘eviction’, but TV media reads the same script

Another year, another probable encroachment drive. But sections of TV media were back with the same headlines featuring Shaheen Bagh – skipping the tough questions about rehabilitation to orbit around a 2019 protest against the controversial citizenship law.

Amid outrage over a possible eviction of nearly 4,000 families in Uttarakhand’s Haldwani, after a high court order declaring the land as railway property, sections of the media tried to give the issue a communal spin, terming it “Shaheen Bagh 2.0”, and even alleging “land jihad” – a Hindutva conspiracy theory suggesting Muslims buy and encroach on properties as part of a campaign to displace Hindus and change demographics.

Most of these families are Muslim. On Wednesday, they moved the Supreme Court against the high court order, and claimed that they have been living in the area for decades and even paying house tax. A few media reports also highlighted that the land houses at least three government schools, a bank, a few private schools, and several religious sites and business establishments.

The Supreme Court, meanwhile, stayed the verdict on Thursday, noting that 50,000 people can’t be uprooted in seven days and that “some rehabilitation should be given” to resolve the “human problem”. It will hear the matter again next month.

However, for a section of the media, a black-and-white gaze had seemed more convenient. There were ample examples of this kind of coverage even last year during the Jahangirpuri demolitions and other anti-encroachment drives. TV journalists had shouted, climbed on bulldozers, and offered eulogies to the might of the State and its bulldozers.

In August 2020, ordering the removal of more than 48,000 jhuggis from railway land in Delhi-NCR, the Supreme Court had said the families can only be evicted once a rehabilitation plan is in place. But far from bothering to ask such questions, some anchors even compared the land in Haldwani to a personal house, mocking even the possibility of a rehabilitation. And in the process, they deployed enough dogwhistles and conspiracy theories to delegitimise both the Shaheen Bagh as well as Haldwani protests.

Let’s take a look at what some of the anchors said.

Times Now Navbharat

On the primetime show Logtantra, headlined “Devbhoomi mein zameen jihad”, the anchor referred to the protesting residents as “jihadi gang” and “mombatti gang” on Monday. Uttarakhand, which is also popularly known as Devbhoomi or the land of gods due to an abundance of Hindu pilgrimage sites, was described as the target of an alleged land jihad.

“If the Supreme Court doesn’t order a stay, the bulldozer will move against jihad here,” said the anchor. The channel then raked up the Shaheen Bagh protests, calling it a campaign by “anti-national” elements, and asked if “illegal settlements” by Muslims are just another conspiracy, to alter the demographics of “Devbhoomi”. 

“Haldwani mein Shaheen Bagh wali saazish fail,” read the ticker. “Shaheen Bagh conspiracy has failed in Haldwani.”

Republic TV

On his show Arnab Goswami On The Debate on January 4, Arnab Goswami drew parallels between the Haldwani protests and Shaheen Bagh, calling it the “rule of the roads” over the “rule of law”. “Forget the rule of law, it will be the rule of the roads, just like Shaheen Bagh. In this case two roads have been blocked, just like in Shaheen Bagh…women and children have been propped up right in front of the camera, just like in Shaheen Bagh…I call the politicians who are trying to put the Shaheen Bagh 2.0 model to realise that we are watching them.”

The tickers read “#ShaheenBaghToolkit and “No allowing a Shaheen Bagh 2.0 in Haldwani”.

If this wasn’t enough to make the Shaheen Bagh example clear, Republic played visuals with bullet points to focus on what it called were similarities between the two agitations. 

Times Now

On Newshour at 9, Navika Kumar came up with a strange analogy on 3rd January. “I also like the house on 24, Akbar Road (where the Congress headquarters are located). Can I squat on 24, Akbar Road?”

Comparing the protests to Shaheen Bagh, the anchor, however, pointed out that there was no communal angle to the issue.

On India Upfront on Tuesday, her colleague Rahul Shivshankar, meanwhile, compared the protests in Haldwani to those against Afzal Guru’s hanging, saying that “democracy is endangered” when “religious motives are injected around court orders”. He also listed alleged similarities between Shaheen Bagh and the Haldwani protests, saying that “women and children” were at the forefront in both.

The tickers read “Shaheen re-run in Haldwani?” and “2020 ‘toolkit’ in Haldwani?”. 

Meanwhile, anchor Padmaja Joshi, on her show Nation Wants To Know – headlined “Shaheen Bagh 2.0 in the making?” – compared the disputed land to a house, similar to Navika Kumar’s remarks. “If tomorrow someone comes and sits in your house and says it is my house. You will say leave my house, I will give you another?”

Aaj Tak

On his show Black And White on Wednesday, Sudhir Chaudhary pointed out that there is no communal angle to the issue but gradually brought in Shaheen Bagh and Muslims in the telecast. He blamed the protest on the opposition’s alleged vote bank politics.

In an indirect reference to “land jihad”,  the anchor claimed that the changed demographics in the state were due to increased encroachment. While he quoted data from PEW research center to say there was a rise in Muslim population and a decline in Hindu population in the state between 2011-2021, the alleged rise in encroachment over the same time period was unsubstantiated.

Zee News

On her show ‘Taal Thok Ke’ on Wednesday, headlined “Haldwani mein Shaheen Bagh part 2?”, Aditi Tyagi also blamed the issue on opposition politicians and alleged there was an attempt to duplicate the Shaheen Bagh protests.

After a panelist questioned the presence of government schools on the disputed land, Tyagi said, “So you’re saying that if that was a mistake then we should continue making the mistake? You’re justifying it?”

News Nation

In a show on Wednesday, the anchor even went to the extent of blaming Alt News cofounder Mohammad Zubair for triggering outrage in Haldwani through “fake videos”. Congress and the anti-national gang were the primary reasons for the protests, said the anchor. The YouTube thumbnail of the telecast claimed that the “hatred gang” has a role.

Such reportage is not new to Indian news and dates back to the pre-cable television era. As Kalpana Sharma noted in her column, demolitions were almost a daily occurrence in some parts of Mumbai, particularly after the 1970s. “Newspapers would report these demolitions, but we also read about ‘slum dwellers and citizens’, as if these were two mutually exclusive categories. Such reporting perpetuated the belief that anyone living in a slum was an ‘illegal’ and that the municipality was right in demolishing such slums.”

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court decision on Haldwani was not taken so well by News18 anchor Aman Chopra. “Now there will be Shaheen Bagh part 3,” he tweeted. Wonder if the other rashtravaadi anchors will see this too as an affront to judicial sanctimony.