Ceasefire May Bring Calm, but India’s TV Media Channels Need a Reckoning

The anchors may live in a bubble, but the rest of the world sees through their hysteria, writes Alishan Jafri.

For perhaps the first time, even some of the most loyal viewers of Indian TV news were left stunned by this jingoism. 

(Photo: Kamran Akhter/The Quint)

In the wake of a newly declared ceasefire between India and Pakistan, no recent conflict can testify to the quote “truth is the first casualty of war” as aptly as the dramatic and unprecedented events of 8 May 2025 when Indian TV news media declared a fake news war against the people of India amid the quickly escalating conflict between India and Pakistan. 

News anchors announced to the Indian people that multiple cities in Pakistan were either "destroyed in Indian military strikes" or were "on the brink of capture," in scenes reminiscent of the fall of Poland or Paris due to German Blitz attacks in World War II.

This absolutely dangerous and fake coverage did not stop here.

On the same night, Balochistan was allegedly going to witness a spontaneous uprising and become an independent country. Pakistan’s Chief of Armed Forces, Asim Munir, was "arrested" after a coup was launched by General Shamshad Mirza, according to our news channels. Sadly, India also faced minor setbacks due to supposed suicide attacks in Jammu! But at least Islamabad was "captured" moments after tanks from the armies of both the nuclear states supposedly moved closer to the battlefield.

A senior editor even posted a photo of the coup. It was AI-generated and he didn’t even bother removing the Meta AI watermark. Channels said that Pakistan was already out of ammo, its airforce defeated, and at least two pilots had been captured by the vigilant Lancenayaks of Noida Film City. Naval resistance by Pakistan? Zilch. In fact, Karachi Port was "destroyed" after the "fall of Islamabad" due to an offensive led by Colonel Chavhanke of the Sudarshan Battalion.

What I just told you might sound like fiction, but the tragedy is that all of these lies were told with straight faces, full conviction, and overblown theatrics—complete with sirens and graphics—by India’s mainstream television media.

With the ceasefire now in place, these wildly exaggerated claims are even more embarrassing in hindsight. They did not materialise, and they certainly didn't contribute meaningfully to de-escalation or national security.

Propaganda in High Definition

Indian fact-checkers had a field day firefighting these too-good-to-be-true lies. Even the most hawk-eyed fact-checkers were overwhelmed with lies that were carpet-bombed by sources the ordinary public consider authentic.

For perhaps the first time, even some of the most loyal viewers of Indian TV news were left stunned by this jingoism.

But make no mistake—these channels were not fully exposed. On the streets and in WhatsApp University, these fabrications are still widely believed. It was only after a discreet intervention from the Ministry of Defence—and perhaps a behind-the-scenes rap on the knuckles—that the flood of fake news briefly stopped.

Some influencers tried to retrospectively justify this circus, calling it an info-war and psy-op against Pakistan. In their minds, fact-checking such ludricious lies was akin to helping Pakistan. In the ceasefire’s aftermath, this approach appears not only morally bankrupt, but also diplomatically reckless.

In reality, this was an information war against the collective sanity of 1.4 billion Indians. The Pakistanis, meanwhile, were more than happy with this “sophisticated” psy-op. Not only was it thoroughly debunked and ridiculed on the global stage, it also gave immense cannon fodder to Pakistani military propaganda.

Censorship: The Other Frontline

Around the same time, the Indian government censored several credible journalists, news websites, and content creators in India, with one of its targets being The Wire. A day before that, at least 8,000 X accounts from India were withheld. While X banned these accounts, it objected to the censorship and said that for most accounts, the government gave no legal basis to justify the blanket ban.

Perhaps some of these handles did post content inimical to India’s interests. But the list also included pro-India commentators and veteran journalists—those who had covered Kashmir critically, or questioned the Union government’s handling of security in the aftermath of the Pahalgam attack.

Ironically, the very people outraged by Indian media’s international humiliation also celebrated the banning of these accounts and platforms. Unsurprisingly, Pakistan spun this to claim that India was hiding the truth.

A recent Pew Research Centre survey on misinformation in India helps make sense of this contradiction: while two-thirds of Indians fear fake news, very few are concerned about press freedom. At least 68 percent had no problem with the political censorship of news, and 80 percent believe the Indian media is free to report.

So, Indians vehemently detest fake news, but they have no problem with the biggest reason behind it—a compromised mainstream media and poorly funded and massively under-resourced alternative newsrooms facing attacks for reporting fairly or asking questions to the government.

The huge pay disparity between anchors, reporters, and stringers adds to the rot. In many Tier 2 and Tier 3 towns, stringers earn less than workers under the MGNREGA employment scheme. When alternative spaces tried to attempt quality journalism with a viable model to pay reporters, they are attacked.

A large section that is now lamenting the death of media credibility cheers when independent voices get suppressed under the pretext of national security. In reality, what really threatens national unity and security is TV media and the anchor who takes on the role of a military general.

Let's be clear: what happens on TV is not news or quality analysis. It hasn’t been, for at least the last decade. Watching war coverage on Indian TV is like watching scripted drama—like WWE or Bigg Boss—that people enjoy despite knowing it’s fake. But unlike WWE, where the Undertaker can rise from the dead, Indian media’s lies have real-world consequences. They have incited violence and destroyed lives.

Primetime’s Worst Hour on 8 May

In many ways, 8 May was the best glimpse into how this media would behave if ever a national emergency were to be declared—or 400 par becomes a reality for any party in the future.

But we must also ask: who benefits from this propaganda, apart from Pakistan, which now uses it to portray India as a ”rogue state”?

The answer is clear: Simply put, this propaganda comes with huge electoral benefits for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). It does not serve the people or the Government of India, which is trying to promote a message of secular unity. The ruling party, however, wants its core base to rally behind the polarising slogan, “Dharma dekha, jaati nahi.”

The Indian media doesn't care about world opinion or question the lack of sync between the ruling party's internal narrative and the government’s external message. It operates to serve narrow domestic political interests—no matter the cost. It did so during COVID-19 with “COVID-Jihad”-type coverage, which, while mostly internal, raised some international eyebrows.

But to think that they'll get away with similar lies during the most serious India-Pakistan confrontation since Kargil is just wishful thinking. Even after the Pahalgam attack and before India's Operation Sindoor, they made sure to incite violence and divisions internally by abusing Kashmiris and Muslims. Pakistani propaganda post-Pahalgam had mirrored this, focused on dividing Indians on religious lines. At this point, it seems that these anchors are aiding the Pakistani war effort. 

For example, Indian media falsely identified Qari Iqbal—a civilian from Jammu killed in Pakistani shelling—as a terrorist killed in Indian strikes. Even his grieving family issued the same clarification, but many channels latched on to the propaganda because of his visibly Muslim and Kashmiri identity.

Meanwhile, Pakistani military propaganda is making its own ridiculous claims—such as accusing India of staging attacks on Sikhs in Punjab—claims the Indian government has rightly called deranged.

Pakistani psy-ops are trying to exploit every instance of disharmony being peddled by the media and the right-wing vigilantes who serve as useful idiots for their propaganda. Take the recent viral video of a Saudi flag—bearing the Islamic Kalima—being burned. It was viewed tens of millions of times and fed straight into their narrative.  

Now that both nations have agreed to a ceasefire, the propaganda that dominated our screens looks more like self-sabotage than any kind of strategy.

Outside the Echo Chamber, a Credibility Crisis

These anchors may live in a bubble, imagining themselves spokespeople of a superpower—but the rest of the world sees through their hysteria. Calls to “turn Pakistan into Gaza” do nothing to hurt Pakistan; they only make India look like the aggressor in the global public opinion—even as Pakistan continues to kill civilians in Jammu and target many others in Punjab.

In the early hours of 10 May, Pakistan announced Operation Bunyan-al-Marsoos against India. It came less than an hour after the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director Ahmed Sharif’s late-night press conference, in which he vowed to avenge the alleged Indian attack on three Pakistani air bases. Multiple attacks followed in Jammu & Kashmir and Punjab.

Ironically, the warmongers who had "captured Islamabad" in their studios earlier, were fast asleep when an actual war-like situation arose.

Now that a fragile calm has returned to the subcontinent, following the ceasefire, the responsibility lies with the Indian public. If they don't demand accountability from these channels and stand up for journalists and other credible alternative sources of news, they will continue to be seen as gullible fools on the world stage.

If India really wants to have control over the narrative in a post-ceasefire world, it won't come with chest-thumping warmongers on TV or through censorship of critical democratic voices and blanket bans, especially in the era of VPNs.

It will come with the freedom to have quality reportage and analysis. It will come with fixing accountability, ensuring transparency, and the freedom to ask questions. It will come with a well-thought ideological and strategic counter to the Pakistani propaganda effort. The Indian government and the armed forces through Foreign Secretary Vikram Misry, Sofiya Qureshi and Vyomika Singh are already doing that.

The question is: now that the guns have fallen silent, will Indian media and warmongering influencers present the country as a democratic, secular, and law-abiding nation with a right to defend itself before the world, or will they continue to be a global embarrassment for India?

(Alishan Jafri is a journalist based in New Delhi. This is an opinion article and the views expressed are the author's own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)