Mumbai under the lens
By Sakshi Gupta Posted Mar 31 2009
CHAU NGUYEN/ Global Journalist
Photo Gallery
A fire and fury of activity burned through the world of India’s online community while gun-shots and fire rocked Mumbai, the country’s financial capital. The 60 hours of terror not only highlighted India’s security lapse but also the rising importance of online media and Indian citizen journalism.
The attacks were widely dispersed and affected millions of people, making it difficult for any news channel to cover it end-to-end. New media complemented effectively by providing coverage and useful information like helpline numbers, which news channels initially ignored.
CNN reported that 80 updates arrived every 5 seconds on Twitter.com, a social network site that provides real-time social messaging and statuses between co-workers, friends and family.
Twitter user naomieve captured the feeling well: “Mumbai is not a city under attack as much as it is a social media experiment in action.”
Its updates served as public service announcements on where to donate blood, a news ticker with death toll updates and even comic relief.
One Twitter user wrote, “Random 3 a.m. question while we wait for news to filter in: Why doesn’t our PM move his facial muscles when he communicates?”
Numerous blog posts and thousands of pictures were uploaded on Flickr, an image hosting and online community platform. Google mapped the attack sites and a Wikipedia page has been updated at least a thousand times with full descriptions of the attacks’ strategic sequence.
Social news sites like Mahalo and Ground Report have also been active in Mumbai, and covered the attacks with as much activity if not more than traditional media channels.
Blogs like Mumbai Help (www.mumbaihelp.blogspot.com) proved helpful with providing information on helpline numbers in the city and suggestions like, “Suggest you avoid calling. Lines are bound to be screwed.”
New social media gave common Indian citizens an opportunity to come together, discuss their woes and create their own action plans with a global appeal and reach beyond traditional media. The traditional media’s push mechanism provides only select opinions while new media’s pull mechanism is designed for more interactivity and a wider spectrum of opinions.
People around the world posted their comments and viewpoints on the Mumbai attacks. One British citizen commented on a blog post that expressed shame over India’s recurring violence, “There is no need to be ashamed—Islamic terrorism affects all countries in the world. Very, very sad to see this happen to such a wonderful country like India. My thoughts and prayers are with you …”
Selections from video-sharing Web site YouTube supplied personal experiences and multiple perspectives of people who managed to use their cameras. Videos from local news channels to those captured by eyewitness and even from Pakistanis taunting the Indian army are available. A timeline-based, live-streaming news feed software, Dipity, even tracked unfolding events by plotting news stories and YouTube videos.
It’s not as if the traditional media was caught napping. They did a great job at providing up-to-the-minute information despite clear safety risks. Hundreds of reporters gambled their lives to cover the entirety of attacks. News channels and print publications rallied hundreds of thousands of people together to build campaigns against the lax administration and talk shows provided citizens platforms to vent anger and ask direct questions of the administration.
Some traditional media might have sensationalized certain things, but in a way this helped the general public redeem their anger against the government. For instance, R. R. Patil, the now ex-Deputy Chief Minister of the state of Maharashtra, was made to resign for one irresponsible statement he made to the media. He said that small incidents like this keep happening in big cities like Mumbai. His statement reeked of political arrogance, and the media gave a message to politicians that at the end of the day they are accountable and reinforced confidence in the media’s power.
But was all this to help the general public or to just a scoop to raise their ratings? Why did they announce that their channel was the first to flash a story, some exclusive pictures or an interview? In their eagerness to be the first to break a story, didn’t they also provide the terrorists an easily accessible, up-to-the-minute information source? Imagine the Indian commandoes trying to “sneak” in while TV channels covered their movements live.
“Anger at the media for the coverage of the terror attacks in Mumbai is apparent on the blogosphere,” UK blogger Neha Vishwanathan wrote on her blog www.withinandwithout.com. “The mainstream media appears to have taken the approach of ‘shock and shake,’ as opposed to verifying rumors before reporting them.”
Vishwanathan wrote that she believed first-hand accounts posted by various bloggers were more reliable sources than traditional media and that their personal accounts conveyed the pain and twinge of the moment better than news channels.
Arun Shanbhag, a south Mumbai blogger, wrote, “When I saw the dome of the Taj burning, my heart! It is all in knots! I am overwhelmed! Finally tears, in torrents! ...Will the Taj be there when I wake up?” It is unlikely that a traditional reporter would have written the same.
Was the traditional media in a way responsible for the deaths of dozens of Indian troops and hostages? They might have to pay for it if they were. A petition from the specially-made site www.smallchange.in has been signed by more than 20,000 and filed in the High Court against the media channels.
The petition says, “What they were broadcasting in the name of the news, were in fact the exact operational procedures, locations, and actions of our anti-insurgency forces! Minute-by-minute!”
On another disappointing note, these channels focused all their attention on the two big venues of The Taj and The Obeori, perhaps because of the celebrities stuck inside. The Taj might be the icon of modern Mumbai but does that warrant channels to completely ignore the place where it all started—the Chatrapathi Shivaji Terminus (CST) railway station? Were they too busy showcasing fancy people in distress and expensive furniture to be bothered with the 30 dead bodies scattered all over the CST?
All these news channels and publications created a huge outcry over the disunity of India’s political parties at the time of a national crisis. But did any one of these channels come out of the rat race and try to join hands with the other in an attempt to build a more powerful organization, such as a joint campaign to fight corruption and improve administration? All they did was keep flashing that they were the first to report news. If they can be competitive at a time of such national crisis, why blame the politicians alone?
At the same time, one may claim that even bloggers blog for visibility in an attempt to be recognized as leaders. They were also looking for scoops but in the case of traditional media channels, scoops are linked more to commerce.
Is social media really the answer to the flaws of traditional media? Popular wisdom never fails to condemn actions based on profit. Maybe the traditional media’s actions are just that, or maybe something more.
“The role of the online community in India has not ended with the Mumbai terror attack,” blogged social media enthusiast Gaurav. “We need to come together to shape a moderate, nuanced online discussion on the 11/26 Mumbai terror attack to bring back calm and peace to Mumbai and ensure that we don’t repeat the mistakes others have made after such tragedies.”