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LAWMAKING CHALLENGES & ISLAMIC IDENTITY PROMOTION: DAWN AND JANG'S INSIGHT INTO KARACHI'S ETHNIC TURMOIL
1MR MASAUD HASSAN, 2DR. FAZLI HUSSAIN, 3DR. IMTIAZ AHMAD, 4DR. BADSHAH REHMAN, 5PROF. DR.
ARAB NAZ
1Lecturer, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Malakand, Chakdara, Dir Lower, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Email: iiunione@gmail.com 2Coordinator Department of Media and Communication Studies NUML Islamabad, Karachi Campus,
emailfazli.Hussain@numl.edu.pk 3Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Malakand, Chakdara, Dir Lower, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, email: dostisw@hotmail.com (Corresponding Author) 4Assistant Professor, Department of Islamic Studies and Religious Affairs, University of Malakand,
Chakdara, Dir Lower, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 5Dean Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Malakand, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pakistan.
Abstract-Karachi's multi-ethnic contour remains a source of communal strain leading to disorder while polarizing body politic including the press and legislature. The research aims to see how English and Urdu editorials treated Karachi's ethnic strain in the 2000s which also witnessed May 12, 2007, ethnic mayhem claiming dozens of innocent lives. The researchers selected two newspapers Dawn and Jang while adopting the purposive sampling method to decipher if peace journalism was practiced in sampled dailies' editorials amid promotion of Islamic identity and challenges to lawmaking. Having conducted content analysis of the editorials of Dawn and Jang, the research concludes that both dailies succeeded in practicing peace journalism; with Jang carrying more editorials indicating unity in diversity approach while shying away from Islamic identity, meaning Jang leads Dawn in contributing to peace journalism cause despite lawmaking challenges.
Keywords: Peace Journalism, Press, Content Analysis, Dawn, Jang, Islamic identity
1. INTRODUCTION:
Pakistan fails to resolve ethno-political issues since the late 1940s. The ethnic question got worse with every passing day in the country which put the issue under the carpet even during the worst of times like the 1971 Dhaka Fall when the country got dismembered due to the ethnic imbalance between the eastern and western wings. The state has never worked on national integration, neither any government showed any interest in resolving the ethnic politics by failing to give a due share in resources to small federating units—including Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK)—and to acknowledge as well as cater for their linguistic and cultural needs.
The ambivalence regarding ethnic politics causes problems for the state per se; with small provinces getting engaged in ethnic politics, demanding a fair share in resources to make a retreat from ethnic politics which castigates Islamabad and Punjab (Khan , 2005). The narrow-minded state nationalism depicted in Urdu and Islam make present-day Pakistan see multiple ethnic nationalisms in all three small federating units; with Punjab also seeing Serikis demand their due rights from Islamabad. Sindhi ethnic politics has got subdued but has a long history of clamouring for the rights of Sindh and got started even after independence when the refugee junta dominated by Indian Muslim refugees usurped powers, ordering the Sindh provincial managers to relocate to Hyderabad so that the new state could take charge in Karachi. When the new state replaced the Sindh capital, the foundation of Sindhi ethnic politics was laid which got more vociferous in 1954 when the state announced one Unit scheme. On the other hand, Pakhtun ethnic politics had all the way been a different ball game because Pakhtun nationalist leader and freedom fighter Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan popularly known as Bacha Khan opposed Muslim League politics which led to great animosity between the new managers of the
Pakistani state and Pakhtun nationalists resulting in state oppression against the Khudai Khidmatgars or Servants of God who also clamoured for Pakhtuns' due rights and recognition of their identity in the new federation of Pakistan.
The same is the case with the Baloch sub-nationalist forces which got vociferous due to the ethnically-structured state's disregard for the integration process and its failure to give Balochs their due rights in resources while shying away from acknowledging their identity at the state level. Of late, Baloch ethnic nationalists have remained a potent danger for the state, considering the latter's flawed policies towards its territory-wise biggest Baloch province; with China's One Belt One Road Initiative whose flagship project in China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) culminating in Balochistan's Gawadar port becoming a thorn in Baloch side considering their less and less representation in the 'game-changing' CPEC1.
The ethnic politics yet to be introduced here is the one launched by the Indian Muslim refugees who migrated to Sindh in droves. The literature review section will see details on the Mohajir ethnic politics but shedding brief light on it, suffice it to say, Mohajirs remained harbingers of state nationalism in the pre-1971 state while considering ethnic struggles of other small provinces as parochialism and narrow provincialism.
However, when Indian Muslim refugees felt neglected in the power corridors amid the arrival of a Sindhi prime minister they started their violent ethnic nationalist drive, launching the Mohajir Qaumi Movement in the late 1980s, raising voice for perceived and real injustices. It's the Mohajir ethnic campaign that took the country's southern tip on the storm, pitting Mohajirs, Sindhis, Pakhtuns and Punjabis amongst others against each other; with communal tension in the late 80s, 90s and the 2000s getting worse, seeing mayhem in the shape of loss of precious innocent lives and property, making government now and then call the army and paramilitary forces in aid of civil administration to control the situation.
2. RESEARCH OBJECTIVES AND QUESTIONS:
Covering Karachi's violence got difficult; with the frenzied city also dividing the journalists on ethnic lines, causing great harm to objective reporting which got further damaged when reporters were browbeaten, and their offices ransacked. Karachi has seen the incendiary narrative since 1954 when the Urdu-speaking Indian Muslim refugees made their separate platforms for raising their voice. But the furry got wild in the mid-1980s, continuing in the 90s, as the late 2000s witnessed May 12, 2007, ethnic mayhem when militants of the ANP, MQM and Pakistan People's Party (PPP) amongst others entered violent clashes, claiming more than 34 human lives2.
Amid such violent clashes, no sane mind could expect from journalists and news media to give fair coverage to Karachi's ethnic turmoil while practicing ideals of peac e journalism; with newsmen being threatened by militants of parties like the PPP, MQM and the ANP, as well as religious groups like the Jamaat-e-Islami amongst others. The research work aims to see how Urdu and English newspapers editorialized Karachi ethnic turmoil amid violence committed against common people, journalists as well as newspapers offices. The first research query raised here is if newspapers editorials practiced peace journalism in the shape of shedding light on oppression and violence against Karachi's ethnic minorities in the incendiary the late 2000s witnessing May 12, 2007, ethnic violence, or they only got involved in promoting state nationalism. Also, if they raised their voice for unity in diversity in the said era considering Karachi's diverse contours. The research seeks to find out if leader writers remained committed to presenting the solution of Karachi turmoil in the 2000s and if they shed light on the
1 Also visit https://dailytimes.com.pk/842464/cpec-is-a-game-changer-fm-addresses-ndu-under-training-officers/, We accessed on 20-11-2021.
2 Also visit https://www.dawn.com/news/246766/riots-dismpt-karachi-calm-34-killed-140-injured-rivals-trade-allegations, we accessed on 21-11-2021
causes of violence. Last but not the least, if editorials favoured any ethnic group to reach our research objective of how the press treated Karachi's ethnic turmoil through its editorials during the late 2000s.
3. LITERATURE REVIEW:
Pakistan's national integration issues trace back their history to the colonial era when the British Ra j as a colonial power adopted policies that resulted in favoured and disfavored linguistic groups. As an alien power, the colonizers had to justify their presence while as a colonial power they had to subdue various Indian groups. Justifying their presence and illegal rule in the subcontinent, they promoted literature based on racism, arguing that the colonial white race had been the best to manage the colonized Indians since the latter, they said, had not been able to manage their affairs. As for running their Indian colony smoothly, they adopted the policy of favored and disfavored groups as a result of which favored groups got ensconced on top jobs in the British administration and military bureaucracy, leading to the discontent of others (Siddiqa, 2007).
3.1. Colonial era favoritism:
Pakistan's Powers structure should be seen through the colonial lens; with the Punjabi Muslims as well as Muslim elites of the minority provinces being favoured by the British for their loyalties (Khan , 2005)._Punjabi Muslim landlords provided troops to the imperialists in the 1857 War after which the British and the Punjabi Muslim elite remained hand in glove, as the latter got many favours from the British which enlisted thousands of Punjabis in the British Indian army. UP's Muslim elites remained in close alliance with the British colonizers who gave official status to the minority Urdu language while ignoring the majority Hindi language. Also, the British granted large land tracts to Muslim landlords in UP which saw the dismantling of the old Jagirdari system wherein the Mughal emperor remained the only Jagirdar while keeping the land ownership, with his agents in feudal/'Jagirdars' only collecting land revenue as well as providing troops to the Mughal emperor (Rahman, 2013). By granting permanent ownership to the landlords, the British strengthened Punjabi Muslim landlords and UP Muslim elites. Also, the colonizers succeeded to divide the Hindu majority and Muslims, particularly in the minority provinces by giving official statutes to minority language Urdu, implementing the 'divide and rule' policy. Punjabi and UP landlords loyalties produced returns when the British decided to spread their tentacles after the 1857 Mutiny by introducing the bureaucratic state in colonial India in the shape of giving government jobs to common Indians to not only run the colonial administration smoothly but to replenish the ranks of standing army of colonial India3. The obvious choice for the colonizers was to select ethnic Punjabis and Muslim Upites resulting in both groups' lion's share in the civil and military bureaucracy, boosting their socio-economic status in the colonial era which continued after the creation of Pakistan.
3.2. National Integration In Post-Colonial Pakistan:
With the late 1940s witnessing one of history's biggest migrations, Muslims from the UP province and other areas came to Sindh and Punjab in droves. They got integrated into Punjab but Sindh's situation remained different, leading to communal politics in the country's southern tip. Anyways, the post-independence Pakistan saw both ethnic Punjabis and Urdu-speaking Indian Muslim refugees get ensconced on top jobs; with the former dominating the army while the latter overwhelming the Pakistan Muslim League (Waseem , 2016). With the two platforms dominated by both groups, oppressed Bengalis, as well as the rest of other ethnic groups in West Pakistan, could not find any state outlet to gain powers leading to ethnic politics.
The ethnic campaign which dismembered the country, leading to the independence of present-day Bangladesh, was the Bengali ethnic nationalism which was also based on demanding a due share in state resources as well as calling for the recognition of the Bengali language as the official language
3 Also see "Changing perspectives", Dawn Magazine (Karachi), April 6, 2014.
like Urdu (Phadnis, 2001). But their concerns fell on deaf ears in the Western Wing dominated by ethnic Punjabis and Indian Muslim refugees or Mohajirs who through various means of newspapers and schools textbooks promoted narrow state nationalism. Both groups being the harbinger of the state nationalism designed school books which while indoctrinating children and producing ignoramuses promoted narrow state nationalism and discouraged communal diversity, leading to intolerance within the provinces, as well as small provinces grievances against Punjabis and the Indian refugees.
The way both groups designed schools textbooks, leaving no stone unturned to produce religiously and ethnically intolerant minds, both groups also dominated the newspapers and airwaves proliferating views that suited their vested interests. Likewise, the post-partition era saw Mohajirs dominate the Karachi press scene, later on leading to a questionable coverage of ethnic issues in the Sindh capital now inhabited by a plethora of migrants including Mohajirs.
3.3. Karachi press in socio-economic context:
The query arises as to why only Mohajirs and Punjabis dominated the press scene in the post-colonial state of Pakistan considering other minority groups also existed. No country could easily do away with its colonial past. The same remains the case with Pakistan where groups in Punjabis and Indian refugees succeeded in gaining socio-economic powers the way they did in British India. Punjabis and Mohajirs' strong socio-economic backgrounds amongst other reasons enabled them to make it to the media industry including newspapers.
Pakhtuns, Sindhi and Balochs amongst others never enjoyed the confidence of the imperialists with the colonized land of the present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and neighboring Afghanistan up in the arms against the colonizers. The British only used the Baloch land for strategic means like Afghanistan to secure their Indian colony4. Sindhis, in the same breath, were held in low esteem as compared to their counterparts in Punjab leading to low literacy levels among non-Punjabis and non-Urdu-speaking groups. With fighting the British colonizers, and almost no education, present-day Pakistan ethnic minorities hardly enjoyed any socio-economic benefits in the British as well as post-colonial era leading them to a further backward position in the multi-ethnic Pakistan where only educated young men and women speaking either Punjabi or Urdu language made it to the media industry including newspapers.
3.4. CHALLENGES TO PEACE JOURNALISM AMID MEDIA FRAMES OF ETHNICITY:
The lack of a level-playing field in the post-colonial Pakistan for Pakhtuns, Baloch and Sindhis amongst others due to their weak socio-economic backgrounds amid absence of lawmaking via a democratically elected parliament made their presence smallest in Pakistan's media industry including radio, TV and newspapers resulting in the Punjabi and refugee dominance in the media industry which per se became a major obstacle to peace journalism in a volatile Sindh province. The concept of peace journalism was first introduced in the 1980s by a Norwegian professor who said media carry responsibility while reporting during both positive and negative peace, stating media must stand by oppressed groups. Negative peace means when there remains a war in the society/state; with almost no institution able to work, as per the advocates of peace journalism who express the view journalists must work for peace even during positive peace when there is no war but groups remains disconnected. However, Karachi's ethnic turmoil, sometimes witnessing positive peace and sometimes negative peace, saw ideals of peace journalism being trampled upon when journalists somehow failed to practice peace journalism either due to violence or death threats to them or strong-armed tactics used against their organizations or due to ethnicity/ideology frames which prevent journalists from practicing peace journalism in troubled areas. Media frames have now become quite an old concept, stating any news is not accurate or fair or even true but any news gets passed through certain frames which affect its accuracy and fairness. Framing theorists believe any news item may pass through the
4 PhD thesis titled 'Newspapers' Coverage of Ethnic Issues in Karachi' of Dr. Imtiaz Ahmad, 2017, page 77, Chapter Ethnicity, Nationalism and State: Approaches and Issues.
political or economic frame or any other gate as a result of which readers/viewers don't get what it was.
Frames are not restricted to political or economic ones, considering every state, society, as well as press system, have their dynamics impacting journalists or news organizations. Most of Karachi's journalists are Urdu-speaking middle-class urban Mohajirs who migrated from India in the late 1940s and have been in the media industry including newspapers due to their strong socio-economic backgrounds since the British era. These Mohajir journalists have for long not been able to experience a diverse culture in the workplace/newsroom or home surroundings considering their migration in droves to overwhelm the Sindh capital. On the other hand, other ethnic groups never made it to the newspaper or media industry considering their low literacy rate due to their poor socio-economic backgrounds since the colonial era. Hence, it had always been Mohajir journalists of the Sindh capital who have covered Sindh's best city and saw it from their lens or frame due to which researchers aptly bring in the ethnicity frame to the issue of coverage of Karachi's ethnic problem. When this researcher talked to The Express Tribune editor Kamal Siddiqi for his version on how the ethnicity frame has affected journalists covering multi-ethnic Karachi, he expatiates in the following words: "In fact, it is very difficult for journalists to understand issues from a human perspective and its main reason is that (Mohajir) reporters have had their interactions in a very homogeneous environment or let me put it this way that they interact with people in their newsrooms, etc having the same ethnic/religious background as well as the same socio-economic status, that is, the working middle-class (in case of Karachi). And the working middle-class Urdu-speaking Indian Muslim refugees' issues are that of the ever-crumbling transport system, etc for which this working middle-class—to which most Mohajir reporters also belong—hold the unruly Pakhtun drivers responsible for... And this way the same middle-class Mohajir reporters have got their stereotypes regarding slum dwellers comprising mainly migrants from upcountry and other non-Mohajir groups. The stereotypical attitude of (Mohajir) reporters will show no signs of abating until the migrants/slum dwellers themselves become part of the newsroom staff."
4. FORMULATION OF RESEARCH PROBLEMS AND RELATED METHODOLOGIES:
Karachi's multi-ethnic contour has always been the source of turmoil leading to ethnic violence which started simmering in the mid-1950s but got worse in the mid-1980s when a Pakhtun driver crushed to death a Mohajir college girl Bushra Zaidi leading to a severe ethnic frenzy which continued on and off until now. May 12, 2007, ethnic mayhem claiming 34 precious human lives, as well as causing loss to property was part of the long chain of ethnic violence started in the late 1940s involving in one way or the other Mohajirs, Sindhis, Pakhtuns and Punjabis amongst others and impacting Karachi's every walk of life including the press which saw strong-armed tactics against journalists and newspapers organizations leading to a possible skewed coverage of ethnic violence. The research aims to see how the Karachi press editorialized the incendiary era of the 2000s which also witnessed May 12, 2007, ethnic violence by comparing editorials of English and Urdu newspapers through scientific methods of discourse and content analysis for which two newspapers namely Dawn and Jang have been selected through the purposive sampling method. Jang is selected because of its large circulation while Dawn remains the largest-circulated English daily read in the power echelons.
The starting point for studying editorials of both newspapers remains May 13, 2007, considering May 12, 2007, ethnic mayhem. The researchers carried out a textual analysis of newspapers published in 2007, 2008 and 2009 with every fourth day's editorials of both dailies coming under perusal. As the research does not focus on any particular year, the three-year editorials get treated through aggregate percentage points to reach any conclusion regarding the editorial treatment of ethnic issues in the entire 2000s.
4.1. Data codification:
To have a comprehensive discourse analysis researchers study editorials from the following angles which are also codes defined in detail below:
1. Is ethnicity a problem? If any editorial considers ethnicity, resulting in violent clashes, an issue to be dealt with.
2. Ethnic context: Any editorial content is written in the 'ethnic context' if any ethnic group is named, or any issue(s) regarding any linguistic group-- which could either lead to clash or integration—is talked about.
3. Unity in diversity: If the contents deal with Karachi ethnic affairs as a consequence of assemblage of linguistic groups which need to be pacified by a power-sharing deal amongst them which in turn leads to 'unity in diversity.'
4. State nationalism/Pakistan ideology: This code will contain those editorial contents which deal with the unity of people based on the two-nation theory which discourages ethnic identities while promoting Pakistanism and the Islamic identity.
5. Historical perspective: If the content seeks to discuss identity issues from a historical perspective and make any effort to explore the history of Karachi groups.
6. Ethnic preference/tilt: Whether the content remains biased against or in favour of any ethnic group.
7. Solution: Editorial content talking regarding solutions other than the two-nation theory and administrative remedy is presented by code named as a solution. Most of Karachi's ethnic problems remains connected in one way or the other with transport issues, encroachments, land grabbing etc. So, any remedial steps discussed in the context of the aforementioned issues get codified as the solution.
8. Community condemned: Whether opinionated content used any negative adjectives without attributing them to proper witness accounts or other reliable sources.
9. Ethnic actors: The discourse analysis will also help us extract which ethnic actors have been named in editorials.
10. Ethnic conflict: The code ethnic conflict means any editorialized content which contains conflict or bad relations between communities.
11. Ethnic relations: The code means the content will contain both good and bad relations amongst communities. This category is also regarding those opinionated content that cherishes Karachi's multi-lingual legacy.
12. Incitement to violence: This code deals with any editorial content which does not deal with issues as per the law but calls for violence.
13. Causes: If any content sheds light on causes of ethnic turmoil in Karachi, it has been put under the 'causes' code.
14. Impartial: If the editorial is written impartially.
15. Mohajir Integration: If the editorial remains in a reconciliation tone calling for Mohajir integration.
16. Mohajir Separatism: If the content is based on separatist tendencies for Indian refugees.
17. Provincial Autonomy favored or condemned: Whether provincial autonomy is favoured or otherwise.
18. Indian involvement: If the discourse links ethnic violence with Indian involvement.
5. Dawn and jang editorial treatment of 2000s ethnic turmoil in karachi:
They say editorials are the backbone of a newspaper which if one wants to evaluate must read them first. The outlook editorials present also get reflected in the contents of the entire newspaper. If the editor requests you write editorials, it means he has posed great trust in you which reflects how much important the role of a leader writer is. Pakistani journalism has over the years produced some top leader writers who contributed to the cause of objective press. But the lack of professional editors in the news media particularly in print media has made journalism veer off the objectivity path not least in a multi-ethnic city like Karachi.
Pakistani media personnel have no idea regarding the importance of a professional editor whose tutelage affects editorial writing, neither have media students any knowhow regarding the role of a professional editor whose sublime but responsible intellect steers the paper through bold, upright and pithy editorials. Who is a professional editor? When the scribe put the query to one of Pakistan top English dailies Dawn's leader writer Muhammad Ali Siddiqi, he articulated: "A professional editor before his hiring cuts a deal with the owner on issues like democracy, foreign policy, economic policy, religious issues, women issues, minorities' issues, etc. Once things get thrashed out then the owner has nothing to do with how the professional editor manages his affairs. However, when the owner is the editor, himself like in the case of Jang, Nawa-e-Waqt, The Express Tribune, Business Recorder, etc., there come owners' financial interests which dictate editorial policy. It's the reason newspapers like The News International carry so many ads on their front pages that they wholly cover it, something inconceivable at Dawn5."
Writing editorials in an ethnically frenzied milieu like Karachi becomes more difficult considering communalism and ensuing violence amongst groups, as well as against newspapers which has happened so many times. Shedding light on any paper's policy regarding coverage of ethnic issues, the seasoned leader-writer remarked: "As for policy regarding ethnic issues, any newspaper has to be very mindful while dealing with the communal problems of a city like Karachi. In editorials too, any newspaper must be very careful in blaming any group. Someone must be wrong, for instance, if we take into consideration ethnic violence in Karachi, but the leader-writer cannot take a stance that Pakhtuns, for example, are wrong. The newspaper must tackle the issue in a very sophisticated way by opting for a stance which criticizes politics of a party or its leadership rather than targeting the whole group."6 Lest the scribes deal with the research questions and objectives, let's first shed light on how the sampled dailies placed editorials regarding Karachi's ethnic issues. Taking help from Table 1, Jang gives more importance to editorializing Karachi's ethnic issues by placing 40 per cent of such editorials as first or top editorial against Dawn's 30.56 percentage points of such content. G iving prominence to Karachi's ethnic turmoil, the Urdu daily surprisingly placed ethnic editorials more prominently than Dawn by placing 53.33 aggregate percentage points of such editorials as the second editorial against Dawn's 41.66 percentage points. With Dawn lagging behind Jang as far placement of editorials regarding Karachi's ethnic problems, the English newspaper, however, published more editorials than Jang, carrying an average of 3.33 percentage points of editorials per year against Jang's 2.33 percentage points.
5 Personnel Interview with Muhammad Siddiqi in April 2016, Karachi.
6 Personnel Interview with Muhammad Siddiqi in April 2016, Karachi.
TABLE 1: Aggregate editorial positions 2007 to 2009
Editorial position Dawn Jang
Average editorials 3.33% 2.33%
FIRST 30.56% 40%
SECOND 41.66% 53.33%
THIRD 27.78°% 6.67%
Table 2: Aggregate Percentage editorials 2007 to 2009
S.NO Averag e Editori als Per Year Is ethnici ty a proble m? Ethnic conte xt Unity in diversit y State nationalis m Histori cal Perspe ctive
Dawn 3.33% 11.11% NIL NIL NIL NIL
Jang 2.33% 20% 33.33 % 6.67% NIL 33.33%
Also, unexpectedly, Jang carried 20 percentage points of editorials from 2007 to 2009 acknowledging ethnicity is a problem as compared to Dawn's 11.11 percentage points in the same period (see Table 2) while the Urdu daily also led Dawn in giving a historical perspective to Karachi's ethnic problems carrying 33.33 percentage points of such editorials against Dawn nil as depicted in Table 2 in 2007, 2008 and 2009 which shows that Jang also carried more editorials (33.33%) written in ethnic context, meaning Jang's leader writers did not shy away from naming the ethnic group.
Table 3: Aggregate Percentage editorials 2007 to 2009
S.NO Solution Causes Ethnic actors Ethnic conflict Ethnic relations Incitement to violence
DAWN 58.33% 66.67% NIL NIL NIL NIL
JANG 93.33% 93.33% NIL NIL NIL NIL
Though both Dawn and Jang shed light on causes and solutions of Karachi's turmoil, Jang led Dawn by having in-depth editorials while carrying 93.33 percentage points of content suggesting solutions to communalism as compared to Dawn's 58.33 percentage points in the same category shown in Table 3. A huge chunk in two-thirds of Dawn editorials shed light on causes of Karachi ethnic matters in the
designated time but Jang led English Dawn carrying 93.33 percentage points of editorials dealing with the 'causes' category. When the researchers presented the data to the former Express Tribune editor Kamal Siddiqi now heading IBA's Centre of Excellence for Journalism (CEJ) and asked if both dailies carried fewer percentage points of editorials regarding 'Is ethnicity a problem?' in 2007, 2008 and 2009, he said identity problem in the late 1980s remained intense but the 2000s remained quite different considering other challenges the city and country faced. "The 2000s saw Karachi having other challenges like the War on Terror and Lawyers Movement amongst other issues which pushed ethnicity to the background," argued the CEJ director7.
Table 4: Aggregate Percentage editorials 2007 to 2009
S.NO Community Condemned Impartial Mohajir Integration Mohajir Separatism Provincial Autonomy Condemned Provincial Autonomy Favored
DAWN Nil 55.56% NIL NIL NIL NIL
JANG Nil NIL NIL NIL NIL 33.33%
With both English and Urdu dailies showing nil in codes like Incitement of Violence, Community Condemned, Mohajir Integration/Separatism, Provincial Autonomy Condemned/Favored, it remains quite striking to note Dawn carried 55.56 percentage points of impartial editorials in the designated period, but Jang published hardly any editorial showing impartiality as shown in Table 4.
5.1. DEPICTION OF PEACE JOURNALISM IN DAWN AND JANG'S EDITORIAL COMMENTS:
With peace journalism being all about raising a voice of minorities while reporting and editorializing in the most balanced possible way in a society/state fractured by failures of national integration, the two relevant codes to help us decipher if Dawn and Jang's editorials have practiced peace journalism during the incendiary era of the 2000s are state nationalism and unity in diversity. If we look at the state nationalism category defined as 'those editorial contents which deal with the unity of people based on the two-nation theory which discourages ethnic identities while promoting Pakistanism and the Islamic identity,' it becomes clear both dailies did not carry any editorial based on state nationalism which is indicative of the fact that both dailies contributed to peace journalism in Karachi battered by ethnic violence.
The same also suggests both dailies did not suppress minorities' voices, bringing us to decipher if both the dailies editorialized Karachi's chronic disintegration problem in the light of unity in diversity code defined as 'if the contents deal with Karachi ethnic affairs as a consequence of assemblage of linguistic groups which need to be pacified by a power-sharing deal amongst them which in turn leads to 'unity in diversity.'' Pleasantly surprising remains the fact that Urdu language Jang led Dawn in unity in diversity category, carrying 6.67 aggregate percentage points of unity-in-diversity-based editorials as shown in Table 2 which augments the view that Jang practiced more peace journalism in incendiary 2000s than English language Dawn.
Dawn did not carry a single editorial in the designated time suggesting unity in diversity with the Urdu dailies equally showing the same trend. When the same was put to the editor of the now-defunct prestigious monthly Herald, he argued: "In the 1980s Karachi was the contesting terrain wherein a struggle was launched to ouster outsiders but it did not happen. So, in the 1980s it was necessary to emphasize unity in diversity but today (2000s) diversity is a fact and now the dispute is on the number.
7 Personal interview with Kamal Siddiqi, arranged at the Centre of Excellence in Journalism (CEJ) in, April 22, 2016.
Today diversity is not something about which readers should be made aware through editorials. Editorials have gone one step ahead wherein they argue that we need to find the number of each community (in Karachi) so that when there is resource allocation it should be made according to those numbers8."
Asked whether the decreasing tendency in the state nationalism-driven editorials is a step towards pluralism, Herald editor Badar Alam has had a different view on the issue. "I don't know whether it is a step towards pluralism but one thing which I want to mention here is that the goal of consolidating the whole country as a market—wherein all services and products can flow easily from one place to another - through religion/Islam has been more or less accomplished. These days we speak different languages but work together. Today Wana's tomatoes are easily being sold in Karachi which is reflective of the consolidation of Pakistan areas as one market. Today Islamic (state) nationalism in most of the country is established and where it is challenged like in some parts of Balochistan one might still come across newspapers editorials emphasizing Islamic/state nationalism. However, where the market consolidation has taken place and where state boundaries are an accepted fact of life or where state nationalism is like a given fact of social and cultural life there you hardly need to emphasize state nationalism."
References:
1. Khan , A. (2005). Politics of Identity: Ethnic Nationalism and the State in Pakistan. Sage Publications.
2. Phadnis, U. (2001). Ethnicity and Nation-Building in South Asia. New Delhi: Sage Publications.
3. Rahman, T. (2013). The Class Structure of Pakistan. Karachi: Oxford University Press.
4. Siddiqa, A. (2007). Military Inc: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy. Pluto Press, .
5. Waseem , M. (2016). Politics and the State in Pakistan. Islamabad: National Institute of Historical and Cultural Research.
8 Personal interview with Badar Alam, at The Herald office, Karachi, on April 25, 2016
