Few of us realize it but the way others see us is quite different from the way we see ourselves.
Take for instance, India and Pakistan.
Born in violence and hatred, the two countries have officially fought three wars and several unofficial wars including an ongoing one in Kashmir.
Naturellement, there’s very little love lost between Indians and Pakistanis, who see each other only as mortal enemies and see their respective positions on various issues as morally superior to the one held across the border.
Newspaper headlines and reports often provide insights, and studied over time reveal the biases, of how the people of a country view a subject. In this case, the subject is India. And the headlines come from Pakistan.
Starting with this post, SearchIndia.com will scour Pakistan newspapers to bring you some of the interesting headlines related to India on an ongoing basis.
Here are a few recent headlines from Pakistani newspapers:
* India votes in blood-stained election
* India behind World Cup move from Pakistan: Mani
* India leaders cower from ‘shoe-cide’ attacks
* 20 hurt in anti-election protests in Occupied Kashmir
* Modi surrounds himself with net to ward off shoes
Indian Headlines from Pakistan Newspapers added by SearchIndia.com on
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this is why pakistan must die.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Pakistan’s best hope lies in merging with India.
Very innocently, what is wrong with these headlines? The only fault I can see is that they highlight some aspects of the news that we wish would rather remain in small print. I am sure it works the other way round too. Now there may be some instances of false reporting.. If they want to cheat themselves, who cares?, let them, all they want.
@jay:This is…
Sure. This is what a biased media can do. Make you think everything is black and white when it’s all shades of grey.
@SI: Quit fooling yourselves. Never gonna happen. Although I think there is a good chance it’ll be dependent on US (eating your tax money) for a long time.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
1. We (Indians) take pride in our elections and contrast our periodic elections with the dictatorship in Pakistan. They (Pak) look at our elections as blood-stained. (see the headline).
We consider Kashmir an inviolable part of India…they describe it as occupied-Kashmir.
The perspectives are so different in the two countries most likely on a variety of subjects.
2. You write: Quit fooling yourselves. Never gonna happen. Although I think there is a good chance it’ll be dependent on US (eating your tax money)
If you’d told people two decades ago that communism as an ideology would collapse all over the world except in some god forsaken nooks like Kerala and West Bengal, you’d have been committed to some institution.
We do agree on the last part about Pakistan eating our tax $$ – Since 9/11, we’ve given Pakistan $680 million in nonmilitary aid and $1 billion a year for its military. Source: New York Times, May 3, 2009.
“this is why pakistan must die”
Pakistan is not an enemy. We choose to see them as one.
@SI: One can argue that this elections are bloodstained. Many were killed.
Kashmir being a part of India.. I think you should leave that part to Kashmiris and on last count not many would call themselves Indian. They think its an insult as I understand it (like it is in many parts of north-east).
@gnair91: Wishful thinking doesn’t count as fact.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write above: Kashmir being a part of India.. I think you should leave that part to Kashmiris and on last count not many would call themselves Indian
Most Indians (outside Kashmir) do consider Kashmir an inviolable part of India notwithstanding what the Kashmiris themselves might think.
Considering that we’ve rigged most elections in Kashmir over the last several decades and killed tens of thousands of Kashmiris, it’s unlikely we’re going to let the Kashmiris have their say now or at any time in the future.
Now, that is wishful thinking.
The second headline (regarding the World Cup) was reported in a more broad sense in Indian media as well – something along the lines of Pakistan accusing India of not supporting it for the World Cup. The Indian media quoted not just Mani but also people like Ijaz Butt, Zaheer Abbas and a few others. Everyone sang the same tune that India pulled the plug on Pakistan.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write: Everyone sang the same tune that India pulled the plug on Pakistan.
Yes, given the hate prism through which the two countries see each other it’s not surprising that Pak believes India shoved the plug in its bottom.
Dr.UnkHaf D. Aktar : Very innocently, what is wrong with these headlines?
there is nothing innocent here ?
this is a country which thrives on lies which is institutionalised …..
According to Pakis they won all the wars that they fought with India
Genocide committed in Bangladesh is never spoken about
During the Mumbai attack we saw the way Pakistan Television and experts like Zaid reacted and spread all kinds of lies in the TV
After Engineering all the terrorist attacks …the country is always “Shocked” – that its being blamed …
Media’s job in Pakistan is to perpetuate and spread lies and propaganda …..the problem here is that they end up hurting Pakistan also
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write above: According to Pakis they won all the wars that they fought with India
We decisively won in 1971, the 1965 war was a draw and we lost more tanks and planes than Pak (according to scholars like Ramachandra Guha), 1947 was not a decisive win because we lost some territory (now referred to as POK or Pak Occupied Kashmir) and the 1999 Kargil War along with attacks on other parts of India is still continuing (although India may have mostly repulsed the Pak advances in Kargil, India has taken a severe beating in this continuing war with multiple attacks and so many cities bearing the brunt of the attacks).
Pakistan is still alive because India, I guess I read this somewhere, has not started a war in a thousand years, and its not gonna start now. As for merging Pakistan with India, I guess it would jus result in years and years of riots, and Hindu-Muslim fights, not just in that area, but in the whole of India.
Their hatred has been indoctrinated into their blood; I guess we hate them too, but not to the point of going over to Islamabad, barging into hotels and killing hundreds of innocents.
Aww no, I wouldnt ever want to see it merged into us! I wouldnt say all of em, but yea, some of em are like a virus, a fungus, that’ll slowly but surely soak into the entire being (read India) and eat up its insides.
Going by the 61% turnout in the election held in 2008, who knows Kashmir may turn around the Punjab way!! The Problem in Pakistan reminds me of a Tamil dialogue (Not sure of the movie) ” Un Mela Imma Azingatha vachikinu nee enathkku aduthavan azingtha patthi pesera” (When u have so much filth upon you, why are you talking about other’s filth!!!)
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Let’s hope something comes out of all our tax dollars going down the Pakistan sinkhole.
yourmate:Un Mela Imma Azingatha vachikinu nee enathkku aduthavan azingtha patthi pesera†(When u have so much filth upon you, why are you talking about other’s filth!!!)
Mine remains within my country … Pakistan is exporting it all over the world ….
SI : We decisively won in 1971, the 1965 war was a draw and we lost more tanks and planes than Pak (according to scholars like Ramachandra Guha), 1947 was not a decisive win because we lost some territory (now referred to as POK or Pak Occupied Kashmir) and the 1999 Kargil War
1971 – we won decisively ….
1965 – We were 100 miles away from Lahore ….is that victory OR do we measure that by tanks and planes ??? …what about other human casualties etc ???
1999 – Towards the end …Pakis ran leaving what they captured … We drove them away and recaptured each and every inch …
these are the three wars I am referring to ….1947 was a blunder by Nehru ….
Fate in Proxy war is yet to be decided …its still on ….while situation in KAshmir is improving ….Pakistan is moving towards becoming a failed state …
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Other independent observers also seem to think 1965 was a draw.
I could not see anything wrong in those titles. It is the same Indian media is also doing. Pakistan is not just a handful of people, but a country with millions. So the perspective always differs according to the mindset and culture.
I do not believe all pakistanis are terrorists, it is only the media here which created such a view on Pakistan. The result is – all started to believe that Pakistan is a country where every man hates India, and wants to wage a war on India, and India is a country where all good things will only happen and flowers will be showered by angels. Not quite so. Only sad part is that, the country freely allows few such terrorist organisations to exist.
We cannot expect Kashmir to fully support India, as the merging decision was taken just by the Hindu king who represented comparative-less percentage of Hindu population. For Pakistan, it is an area occupied by India [Just like, for China, Arunachal Pradesh is a territory occupied by India]. PoK, as called by India, is known as Azad Kashmir by Pakistan.
In India itself, we have read history lessons that are titled in the following manner, in the primary education, – ‘Arrival of Aryans’ and ‘Invasion of Mughals’. When both are clearly invasions [followed by wars], what is the need to say one is arrival [as if they came and embraced Dravidians] and the other is an invasion. Perspectives always differ and tweaking of media [even history] has been the tactics of all countries.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write: Pakistan is not just a handful of people, but a country with millions. So the perspective always differs according to the mindset and culture.
True, there are some differences within a nation, state or family but a nation or society also has a unique culture or identity that one can analyze as a distinct entity.
Read the chapter How to Read a Society in the book Our Culture, What’s Left of It by Theodore Dalrymple P.166-179.
Btw, did you meet any Pakistanis there? What were their opinions about India (if you both communicated any 😉 )?
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Most likely we have met some Pakistanis here in a restaurant in NYC/NJ but can’t remember the specifics.
But we do remember an encounter with a Pakistani on a train journey in Europe. The guy claimed to be a doctor who had studied in one of those ‘Stans’ (can’t remember if it was Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan…) from the erstwhile Soviet Union but was talking like a semi-literate idiot. Insisted to us there were no Jews in the WTC building on the day of attack and other such nonsense. Of course, all Pakistanis are not like that.
By the same token, we are sure there are plenty of Indian/Hindu idiots who believe Ram lived in Ayodhya, Hanuman could fly and lift the mountain et al.
SI :Other independent observers also seem to think 1965 was a draw.
these are the relevant portions of the link provided by you ….India achieved its objective ….while Pakistan just managed to hold on …because India stopped ….I dont see that a draw …… On the whole till such time issues like Kashmir are not resolved ….these are only temporary victories for India
There have been few neutral assessments of the damages of the war; some of the neutral assessments are mentioned below:-
According to the United States Library of Congress Country Studies:
The war was militarily inconclusive; each side held prisoners and some territory belonging to the other. Losses were relatively heavy–on the Pakistani side, twenty aircraft, 200 tanks, and 3,800 troops. Pakistan’s army had been able to withstand Indian pressure, but a continuation of the fighting would only have led to further losses and ultimate defeat for Pakistan. Most Pakistanis, schooled in the belief of their own martial prowess, refused to accept the possibility of their country’s military defeat by “Hindu India” and were, instead, quick to blame their failure to attain their military aims on what they considered to be the ineptitude of Ayub Khan and his government.[41]
TIME magazine analyzing the conflict,[42] reported that India held 690 Mi2 of Pakistan territory while Pakistan held 250 Mi2 of Indian territory in Kashmir and Rajasthan, Pakistan had lost almost half its armour temporarily.
An excerpt from Stanley Wolpert’s India,[43] summarizing the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, is as follows:
In three weeks the second IndoPak War ended in what appeared to be a draw when the embargo placed by Washington on U.S. ammunition and replacements for both armies forced cessation of conflict before either side won a clear victory. India, however, was in a position to inflict grave damage to, if not capture, Pakistan’s capital of the Punjab when the cease-fire was called, and controlled Kashmir’s strategic Uri-Poonch bulge, much to Ayub’s chagrin.
Dennis Kux’s “India and the United States estranged democracies” also provides a summary of the war.[44]
Although both sides lost heavily in men and materiel, and neither gained a decisive military advantage, India had the better of the war. New Delhi achieved its basic goal of thwarting Pakistan’s attempt to seize Kashmir by force. Pakistan gained nothing from a conflict which it had instigated.
Newsweek magazine, however, praised the Pakistani military’s ability to hold of the much larger Indian Army.[45]
“By just the end of the week, in fact, it was clear that the Pakistanis were more than holding their own.”