BREAKING NEWS from 1979, and some weapon appreciation journalism

We’ve all come to expect exaggerations from Indian TV news anchors, especially in times of conflict. But sometimes they deliver something far rarer: breaking news from 1979.

Yesterday, on Aaj Tak, Anjana Om Kashyap anxiously announced: “Iranian terrorists have taken 66 Americans hostage in Tehran in the US embassy”. 

There was just one small problem.

She was talking about the Iran hostage crisis…from 1979 as Aaj Tak reporter Pranay Upadhyaya politely pointed out. Anjana mistook an old incident being referenced by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt as breaking news. Also, there’s the small detail of the United States not having an embassy in Iran since 1979. Which makes a current hostage crisis inside that embassy somewhat…logistically difficult.

Kashyap apologised for her mistake but the real beauty lies in how spectacularly out-of-syllabus all this must be for the average Indian anchor. 

Meanwhile, over on its English sibling channel, Gaurav Sawant was treating viewers to a lengthy, breathless explainer on the US “doomsday missile” aka Minuteman III. There is a peculiar genre of television reporting that seems uniquely Indian: weapon appreciation journalism. Anchors lovingly describe the range, payload, propulsion systems, and destructive capacity of missiles as if they are reviewing the latest smartphone.

Not even American networks spend this much time enthusiastically narrating the technical specs of the weapons their own country is using. In most places, war reporting focuses on the consequences of weapons. On Indian television, it often focuses on how cool the weapons sound. 

Anyway back to Anjana, here’s a small suggestion for Indian anchors who want to sound a little less clueless the next time they discuss Iran: before the next prime-time war special, maybe spend an hour with Martin Smith’s excellent Frontline documentary Bitter Rivals: Iran and Saudi Arabia. There’s also the Empire podcast series on the history of Iran.

At the very least, it might ensure that the next “breaking news” from the studio is from this century.

From Manikarnika Ghat to the Kashi Vishwanath Corridor, Banaras is being reshaped in the name of vikas. Our new NL Sena asks who pays the price. Power it here.