- Umesh Upadhay elucidates in detail by shedding light on the concept of narratives, the history of Western media, and its transgenerational impact, and dwells deep into the innards of how and why these narratives are built by Western Media in India.
- The reader gets an in-depth understanding of how the cohort of four international news agencies, viz. Associated Press (AP), Reuters, Agence France-Presse (AFP) and UPI, took birth to orchestrate a narrative around Western superiority.
- The book scans across the vastness of the media world and the book of 150 pages is precise and concise and yet the readers will benefit from Umesh Upadhay’s sagacious illustration of the Western Media Narratives on India.
“My interest in the study of Western Media is quite old.” – that’s the first sentence you will see at the outset of the preface by Umesh Upadhyay in his book “Western Media Narratives on India – From Gandhi to Modi”. Yes, indeed – it comes justifyingly from an expert journalist and media executive, who completed his studies in “International Relations” in the early 1980s at the “School of International Studies” at Delhi’s JNU and then went on to have an illustrious career in both International and Domestic journalism, spanning across 40 long years.
‘Narrative’ is often most spoken about in societies but is least understood when it comes to the mechanics of how it works. Umesh Upadhay elucidates in detail by shedding light on the concept of narratives, the history of Western media, and its transgenerational impact, and dwells deep into the innards of how and why these narratives are built by Western Media in India.
The book expounds an exhaustive list of Post-Independence occasions, where international news agencies floated news intending to make Indians read their own country’s incidents from the Western prism.
Umesh ji opens his treasure of memoirs, from the sojourn of four months in Canada as part of his Master’s in 1982. That was the period when Punjab was going through a disturbing turmoil with a section of Sikhs taking up militancy in the state. In July 1982, Giani Zail Singh, Home Minister of India and the former CM of Punjab, was elected to the “Rashtrapati Bhavan”. Umesh ji was left flabbergasted to observe that, in Canada – which had a sizable population of Sikhs even in those years, the news of the world’s most populous democracy, electing a Sikh to its highest position as “President of India” – did not find any place in the Canadian newspapers that he was following up. He finally found a news article about India, but it was about an unfortunate accident, where a bus had fallen into a deep ravine. Umesh ji was taken aback that a bus accident in India found its place in the International Section of a Canadian newspaper, whereas the world’s largest democracy electing its President – that too a Sikh – did not. This experience probably compelled his proactive embarkation into the Western Media Narratives on India.
Seekers of the truth turn researchers when they stumble upon a startling incident. Their quest helps them foresee a mammoth iceberg beneath its visible tip. The torches were thus turned backwards into world history to seek what is behind such anti-Indian Western narratives. The first chapter “It’s an Old Story”, is a result of such fact-finding research and shows us dots connecting and dating back to as old as the 15th century. Starting from the expedition taken by Christopher Columbus, with references to letters written by him, and to Chandrika Kaul’s book published by Manchester University Press in 2003: “Reporting Raj: The British Press and India, 1880 – 1922” and the latest international news reports – the chapter successfully demonstrates to the reader that the Western Media built narratives for profit, power and evangelical motivations. The chapter then runs through the birth of Information Business. The reader gets an in-depth understanding of how the cohort of four international news agencies, viz. Associated Press (AP), Reuters, Agence France-Presse (AFP) and UPI, took birth to orchestrate a narrative around Western superiority.
The book then expounds an exhaustive list of Post-Independence occasions, where international news agencies floated news intending to make Indians read their own country’s incidents from the Western prism. So, it was not merely “reporting of a news”, but “news as seen from the Western perspective”. The book is politically impartial and stays focused on the Western Media Narratives. One of the picks for me is the book’s fairness in sharing befitting appreciation to India’s first Prime Minister Nehru, in being right in his analysis of the working of the Western Media. The book quotes Nehru pointing out, ‘undoubtedly, Reuters has represented in the past, and largely represents today, the British background. They have every right to do so. I do not object to that. But, I do not see why our background and policy should be subordinated to the British background and policy”.
The book counts several occasions, like the vandalising of the Gandhi statue by miscreants in Karachi. Reuters reported that the Gandhi statue had fallen in a gale. The pages chronicle several occasions, including the denigration of Sardar Patel during Hyderabad Liberation, creating fictitious stories of Gandhi and Patel’s sojourn to Palani to take a break amid a national crisis, how Dr Ambedkar was misquoted to create a misunderstanding between national leaders, and how western media turned taciturn when it became public that US leaders had used inappropriate words for Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
From quoting research papers, journals and newspapers, the book and the findings are based on authentic sources. For instance, 230 news articles from March 2020 to June 2021 were examined to study Western Media Narratives on India during the COVID-19 crisis days.
The book recounts Oscar-winning filmmaker Satyajit Ray criticizing and questioning Malle’s motivations, for the latter’s take on poverty, slums and rituals in the documentary Calcutta. Some other eye-opening incidents are listed, giving a detailed account of the errant behaviour of the Western Media, for choosing to use softer words for serious and anti-humanity acts like terrorist attack on Indian Parliament building, for being sarcastic on Indian Space achievements and for undermining India’s great contribution to the world in managing Covid-19 crisis.
The last chapter leaves loads of points to ponder over for both the individuals and the society. I welcome readers to spend a few minutes and re-read this chapter, “Colonizing Minds” – to understand and draw parallels between how the false narratives use the same mantra of colonizing minds, across generations and lands from Latin America and Africa to India.
From quoting poems to research papers and journals and newspapers, the book and the conclusions are based on authentic sources. For instance, 230 news articles from March 2020 to June 2021 were examined to study Western Media Narratives on India during the COVID-19 crisis days. Apart from diving deep into the subject, the book scans across the vastness of the media world when it comes to Western narratives. The book of 150 pages is precise and concise and yet the readers will benefit from Umesh Upadhay’s sagacious illustration of the Western Media Narratives on India.
The book is a must-read for everyone, including journalists and other media persons, academicians, and particularly the youth of the nation. I am sure, you will keep revisiting the book. Happy reading!
(Raghavendra Kulkarni is a Director at Samvada Foundation. An Aerospace enthusiast with an affinity towards art and culture. Views expressed are the author’s own)
Book: Western Media Narratives on India – From Gandhi to Modi
Author: Umesh Upadhyay
Publishers: Rupa
Price: ₹ 398 (Hardcover)
SW Ratings: ****
Dr. Niranjan B Poojar 
Balaji Subramanian