Fake news: Indian media goes berserk – shares pix of downed F-16 in Panjshir

ISLAMABAD: The world’s largest democracy India, and its media Monday again made a fool of themselves when it aired news and posted fake pictures of Pakistani Air Force fighters over the Panjsher valley, allegedly hitting NRF targets and even shared pictures of a downed F-16.A new data study on Tuesday revealed that 51% of news related to Pakistan and Afghanistan by the Indian media was fake.

The Indian media went berserk when the Twitter handle of Ahmed Massoud –claiming to be the Official Twitter account of the son of Massoud Ahmad Shah, shared a picture of an F-16, fairly undamaged on hilly terrain. “The Pakistani Jet Plane that was shot down by the lion cubs #Resistance_Panjshir,” the tweet said and was rapidly shared by Indian and Afghan Twitter accounts. The majority of anti-Pakistan accounts carrying fake Afghan names, photos and IDs have mushroomed over the past few months and have been observed to be operated from India

What the commander of the Panjshir Resistance forces tried to hide was the fact that the picture of the aircraft he shared was that of a United States Air Force F-16 that crash-landed during a training exercise in April 2018 in Arizona, USA. According to G5iO – a platform focusing on using data and analytics to develop insights for policy and public interest said there has been a marked increase in disinformation and fake news proliferating throughout Indian Media related to the Afghanistan conflict. The study showed how Indian media networks not only remained biased in favour of the

National Resistance Front (NRF) through mostly fake reports and analyses. The report based on Twitter data from three major Indian news networks: The Republic, Times Now, and India Today included tweets, news reports, and commentary related to Panjshir over the last 15 days. The Insights shared in the report say there was a predominant use of Fake News – 39% related to Panjshir. More than half (51%) of all coverage related to Pakistan on Afghanistan was fake.

The ratio between fake News and factual reporting was also lopsided, more than half (54%) of the reporting related to Panjshir by Times Now consisted of fake and, or unverified claims being pushed by the NRF. Coverage Bias showed about 67% of total coverage related to Panjshir favoured the NRF’s stance, while 33% comprised statements and claims by Taliban officials.

A visibly irritated Indian media, since the routing of the corrupt Ashraf Ghani government at the hands of the Afghan Taliban, and withdrawal of the US forces, has been blaming Pakistan for the unprecedented upset. Times Now – an Indian news outlet that claims to be the most-watched English News channel shared the visuals on its Twitter handle, prompting a strong backlash. The channel claimed that the Pakistan Air Force was actively participating in the onslaught against the resistance and was supporting the Taliban forces.

However, soon after showing the video clip of an American F-15 flying in a valley, the channel faced a strong reaction as people pointed that the Pakistan Air Force has no twin-tailed fighter aircraft in its inventory.