If Gujarat 2002 communal violence was the first in India to be caught on 24×7 TV news, Delhi’s Hindu-Muslim riots were the first in India to be retweeted, shared and forwarded on social media.
If many said 24×7 coverage deterred riots from spreading to other states in 2002, then the age of fake news and morphed videos added a tech angle to the oldest root cause of all riots – rumours.
In the inability to distinguish between what’s fake and what’s real, what’s Delhi and what’s Aurangabad, what’s Ashok Vihar mosque and Ashok Nagar mosque and the vanishing of trust lay India’s helplessness and rage.
Also read: On Delhi riots, TV channels finally reported news. Then the anchors swooped in
2002 to 2020
In 2002, as the violence and fire spread through Gujarat, then chief minister Narendra Modi was shocked that TV news covering the riots 24×7 were using the words ‘Hindu’ and ‘Muslim’ to describe the rioters. It was breaking an unwritten tradition in news to not name the communities involved so that further hatred is not spread. But when the camera rolls, everyone’s identities and activities are shown live.
In 2002, public trust in TV news was high because 24×7 news was a new beast. In 18 years since, a lot has changed. TV channels have degraded themselves and suffer from low credibility. People prefer grainy, shaky videos captured by smartphones of the riots much more. Every riot-witness is a self-broadcaster today.
In northeast Delhi too, social media seems to have played a crucial role — in perhaps both fueling some of the violence as well as revealing the exact nature of devastation and state (in)action.
It was the steady flow of images and videos on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook that provoked widespread outrage and finally pushed the Modi and Arvind Kejriwal governments to sit-up and take notice. Now, TV news was also relying on these clips, anecdotes and photographs on social media.
The bloodshed, the stone pelting, the Delhi Police breaking CCTV cameras and the dead were accessible to everyone – courtesy a smartphone and cheap internet.
Also read: Who is to blame for CAA violence: Delhi Police or politics of Modi government?
A two-way street
As is the case with most riots, the worst hit were the low-income neighbourhoods in northeast Delhi, which is also among the most densely populated areas.
Needless to say, these areas are seldom covered by media channels and are hence poorly understood in terms of the underlying socio-cultural dynamics. So, when the riots hit and cries for help became urgent, it was the smartphones in the hands of journalists or residents that came to the rescue. Especially when the mobs were targeting anyone with a camera or a crew.
Take, for instance, Indian Express reporter Sourav Roy Barman’s Twitter updates about the situation:
One of the fruit vandalised fruit juice shops and a motor bike repair shop. Also ransacked. Vehicles were dragged out and set in fire. Video in next tweet pic.twitter.com/VJnlM4CAiM
— Sourav Roy Barman (@Sourav_RB) February 26, 2020
My Twitter feed was replete with posts calling out the Delhi Police over their failure to contain the situation. Several Twitter users also pointed out that such cases of inaction often indicated the complicity of the state.
As any IPS/IAS officer will tell you off record: Any riot can be quelled within a couple of hours if there is political will to do so. All riots are fueled by political actors imagining benefits out of it. The street thugs are mere punny men. There is no exception to these rules.
— Nitin Sethi (@nit_set) February 25, 2020
Many called out chief minister Arvind Kejriwal for not doing enough or coming out to the streets.
However, as Christian Fuchs had argued in his paper Behind the News Social — Social media, riots, and revolutions, the effect of technology is often complex and contradictory. “Because society and technology are complex systems…it is unlikely that the interaction of the two complex systems technology and society will have one-dimensional effects,” he explained.
Also read: Delhi violence a riot or a clash? Only liberal intellectuals care, not the dead
The fake news caveat
While fires were still raging in riot-hit areas, fake videos and pictures were making the rounds on social media adding fuel to the flame. In one such instance, a Twitter handle with a large number of followers tweeted a video of a bus driver being assaulted.
“This is the horror being played on the streets of Delhi right now. Did you see the skull cap? They have turned this country into Syria, where Hindus are shit scared,” a Twitter user wrote.
This is the horror being played on the streets of Delhi right now.
Did you see the skull cap?
They have turned this country into Syria, where Hindus are shit scared.
My relatives living in Maujpur haven’t stepped out of their home since 3 days.
— Aviral Sharma (@sharmaAvl) February 25, 2020
The video turned out to be that of an incident, which took place in Aurangabad last week. Despite this, it had garnered quite a bit of attention and was even shared by a member of the BJP unit in Kerala.
Despite such proliferation of misinformation, it would be too deterministic to draw a causal link between these acts of violence and fake videos, pictures or posts being circulated. After all, these platforms are a mirror to society, which often replicate and deepen the power hierarchies.
But, once in a while, like the riots in northeast Delhi as well as the 2011 Arab Springs have shown, it becomes a tool instead of a weapon.
Unlike the finite life of TV coverage, in the digital era, the videos of horror will live and be circulated forever. Years from now, the Delhi riot videos can be shared as another city erupts. These videos are unstoppable.
It is curious that an internet shutdown wasn’t reported in rioting Delhi areas like they were in Uttar Pradesh and Kashmir. Had the state learnt a lesson or did the state want the videos to spread? We will never know.