BBC Documentary: Feeling insulted by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) over its recently released documentary on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Indian diaspora will be holding protest against the media house across various cities in UK on January 29.
The protests will take place in Glasgow, Newcastle, Manchester, Birmingham, and London at 12 noon on Sunday.
The British Broadcasting Corporation’s documentary, “India: The Modi Question” has raised a storm not just in India but also among the diaspora.
Looking at the sensitive nature of the documentary, the Indian government has banned it from being shown in the country. It has also been taken off Youtube for its divisive content and for fear of creating hatred between communities over incidents that took place two decades back. Indian courts have already given their verdicts and sentenced people of both communities for the violence.
London-based consultant, Adit Kothari, who has been active in the diaspora movement says, the British Indian diaspora is enraged, agitated & frustrated with the BBC’s deliberate attempts to run covert and sometimes overt malicious Anti-India and Anti-Hindu agendas. While with the protest, we may see no change within the BBC to organisationally address our concerns but we have to demonstrate our displeasure at the BBC’s attitude.
The diaspora is agitated as the documentary comes on the heels of weeks of anti-Hindu violence in Leicester the tenth-largest city in the UK.
The communal violence, which took the British society and the local police by surprise, was directed at Hindu symbols and homes by the local Muslim youth. Weeks of attacks on Leicester’s Hindus led to many families moving out of the city due to threats and fear.
British Hindus feel that the BBC documentary will create a similar situation in which the Hindus can again be targeted because of biased coverage.
The activist says that the protest against the BBC is to raise awareness about the BBC’s failures regarding its journalistic standards and the royal charter-which aims to provide impartial, high quality, and distinctive journalism, to its viewers.
The BBC documentary has evoked a strong reaction across Indian society.
Lord Rami Ranger, well known British MP in the House of Lords wrote a letter of condemnation to Tim Davie, BBC Director General, saying, among other things, that the timing of the BBC documentary is sinister considering that India and the UK are working for a free trade agreement, India has assumed the presidency of G20 and the UK has an Indian-origin prime minister.
In his letter, Lord Ranger says, the producer has shown a lack of vision, common sense, and judgment by producing such an insensitive one-sided documentary.
In India too, dozens of bureaucrats, retired officers, and judges have written an open letter dubbing the BBC documentary as delusions of British Imperial resurrection.
Many other individuals have launched petitions on the website change.org asking for an independent investigation into the BBC’s actions. Many smell a conspiracy as the diverse nation of nearly 1.4 billion people goes to elections in 2024, saying that the BBC is trying to queer the pitch against Modi.
A petition against the BBC has also been raised in the British parliament, seeking an investigation into the anti-Hindu propaganda and hatred attacks on the Hindu community.
(With inputs from IANS)
ALSO READ | RSS calls BBC ‘toolkit that spreads lies and propaganda’ amid row over new documentary on PM Modi
ALSO READ | ‘Not familiar…’ : US reacts to controversial BBC documentary critical of PM Modi