Anti-Americanism in Indian Media After 9/11

In the United States, media outlets will often try to spin a story in a pro-American fashion, as consistent reporting of anti-American sentiments can doom the reputation of a newspaper or radio station. International media outlets aren't bound by a sense of patriotism when reporting about the United States, and thus, a trend in anti-Americanism can clearly be seen in global media, especially in countries that have strained relations with the United States.

One country that has had an up-and-down wave of feeling for the Americans is India, a nation embattled in military controversy of its own that lends a hand to the way it feels about America. To get a better idea of how Indian media portrayed the United States in the few years following the September 11th attacks, I spoke with University of Maryland professor Dr. Kalyani Chadha, who took part in research on the subject.

Dr. Chadha stated that India has typically always had rocky relations with the United States from a global media aspect, adding that America's apparent position of support for Pakistan will always damper progress between the two nations, something not helped by the lack of knowledge about America within India. A survey of the Indian electorate conducted by the Center for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in 1999 showed that 10% of respondents saw the United States as an enemy, 27% saw it as a friend, 30% saw it as neutral, and 36% had either not heard of the country or simply did not have an opinion. Clearly, the United States doesn't have a major footprint beyond the upper middle class and above in India.

Consequently, while the rural communities in India may not have residents who could point at the U.S. on an unlabeled map, they constantly deal with the turmoil with their neighbors to the west, Pakistan. Indians from all walks of life are able to relate to the country's issues with Pakistan, but few outside of the urban population even know enough about the United States to form an opinion on the country beyond whatever can be read in newspapers or weeklies that make it to those underprivileged areas. Despite the major global influence the U.S. has, it has yet to make deep inroads to rural India.

Although the previous poll showed that the majority of India's opinion on the United States comes from the upper crust of the Indian population, a fact confirmed by Dr. Chadha, that doesn't prevent pro-American sentiment. Since the Cold War, tensions have cooled between the two nations, with India's opinion of the United States growing more positive. The September 11th attacks brought a wave of sympathy and compassion from the Indian media, with newspapers calling the attacks "vicious," "terrible," and an attack on the "civilized world." However, this sentiment was short-lived.

As George W. Bush brought the United States into Afghanistan and Iraq in the months and years following 9/11, the Indian view of the nation changed dramatically. After the start of the Iraq War, a poll from weekly newsmagazine Outlook showed that 86% of respondents opposed the war and 69% saw Bush as a "warmonger." The sympathetic feelings that the U.S. had garnered had been lost in India almost as fast at the had come around the first time. Dr. Chadha noted that Indians saw the American plan of action as hypocritical, suggesting that India should withhold attacking Pakistan in retaliation for terror while the Americans invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. The level of anti-Americanism has since leveled off from that point, but it could have remained more positive had Bush not been so caustic in India's eyes.

The research shows that although the Indian media's depiction of the United States has improved over the last 30 or so years, individual events such as the end of the Cold War, 9/11, and the Iraq War can have drastic effects on the portrayal of the United States on a global media scale.