Tag Archives: Journalist

The funny side of career re-evaluation

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The other day I was talking to my niece. She’s nine. She wanted to know what I did all day. I’m a journalist and I work freelance, which on a practical level means I spend an awful lot of time on Facebook (ok, Twitter too). There’s no inspiring story behind my career choice. With my honours degree in hand, I procrastinated past the deadlines to write the exams for both law school and graduate school. The only faculty still taking applications was journalism. And I only had one day left to apply. I got in.

Fast forward some two decades later and I’m still at it. Don’t get me wrong. It may have been a bit of a default choice but I thoroughly enjoy my work. But here’s the thing: I think I’m done — or at least every six months I think I’m done. It feels like a hamster wheel at times: running really hard only to stay in roughly the same place.

The glory days of journalism, when media outlets had money and journalists had regular opportunities to do good work, are long gone. Now the mantra is “do more with less” and at times it can be a challenge to make a living wage. All of that can feel like an adventure when you’re in your twenties, not so much in your forties.

These days it’s no longer mostly about reporting and storytelling, it’s about “content generation” — generate that content! Modify it! Repurpose it! Manage it! But discerning “consumers” are often left wondering what the point was. I’m not sitting around hating the internet, wondering when this fad is going to be over, but in a lot of ways the digital age has killed the journalism business. The new landscape favours immediacy; it’s all about what’s happening right this very second. It has led to a type of journalism that is narrow and has a short memory. Something that happened three days ago is already old.

And so I sometimes think it’s time for my retrospective: the journalist’s equivalent of an ageing actor’s soft-focus close-up, where I sift through my work, remember the good times, and shut the light as I close the door behind me.

And the future possibilities would be endless, right? I could open that used bookshop I’ve always wanted. I’ll have shelves and shelves of dusty volumes and quirky-funny customers will arrive day after day looking for something obscure and I’ll say things like, “It’s on the second shelf from the back of the store, three levels up from the bottom, with all the other ancient manuscripts.”

Or I could open that home-based jewellery business I’ve been thinking about. You know, the one for which I’ll be importing clunky rings and giant bracelets from ‘AfPak’ and I’ll set up stalls at all kinds of fun craft shows where quirky-funny customers will arrive day after day looking for something “exotic” or “old” and I’ll know just what they want and they’ll leave knowing they’ve never had a jewellery experience like that one and never will again.

Of course, there is the fact that I don’t really know anything about ancient manuscripts or jewellery. Or running a business. Plus, I have a feeling quirky-funny people are overrated. I also get the sense I’d never make a dime. I’m also pretty sure the hamster wheel exists in those businesses too.

And then just as my despondency peaks and I’m about to give up entirely, an email arrives — a response to a long-forgotten pitch. It’s a go. I log out of Facebook, (ok, Twitter too), and tap out an email of thanks to the editor. I guess I’ll stick with the journalism — for the next six months anyway.

— Naheed Mustafa is a freelance writer and broadcaster masquerading as a suburban wife and mother of three

Dilnaz Boga

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A protester takes a break near the Hazratbal shrine during mass protests of 2010.

Dilnaz Boga, known for her in-depth coverage of Indian-administered Kashmir, a region she has covered for a decade, is currently working for the Mumbai-based newspaper Daily News & Analysis (DNA). Her investigative work on Kashmir won the AFP’s Kate Webb Prize in 2011. She has also worked for the Srinagar-based website Kashmir Dispatch as well as the Hindustan Times.

Talking about her work, Boga says she has “concentrated on conflicts on resources all over India. I studied the Kashmir conflict academically and was more interested in its biased/managed representation on the mainstream media, and hence decided to pay more attention to it.” She has also made a documentary, Invisible Kashmir — The Other Side of Jannat, exploring the impact of violence on Kashmir’s children. Here the Herald talks to her about the region and the difficult conditions under which journalists do their job.

Q. Last year, the Indian government allowed Amnesty International to visit Kashmir for the first time since the start of the insurgency. Recently, there has been official acknowledgement of the presence of mass graves. Why do you think the government is finally agreeing to investigate claims of abuse?
A. So far, the government, through the SHRC [State Human Rights Commission] has only covered north Kashmir. The investigating police officer faced many difficulties during investigation, logistically. Despite evidence in local media and a national paper, the SHRC has not bothered to investigate graves in south and central Kashmir. Instead, the whole debate is being hijacked by the government when they talk about Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). In order to skirt the issue of the mass graves, they are playing with people’s sentiments by periodically bringing up AFSPA. No concrete steps have been taken to explore the other graves. I hope they don’t shift the bodies like we have seen in Bosnia.

Q. Is there reason to hope that the abuses may abate or that the militarisation of Kashmir may decrease?
A. Demilitarisation is required in Kashmir – in India, Pakistan and in China. The conflict has gone on for over six decades, and there has been no international intervention. None of these countries are willing to give up power and have managed to associate this struggle for self-determination to issues of nationalism and religion. The people’s movement on the Indian side of Kashmir has gone on despite the loss of thousands of lives. Unless concrete steps are taken at meting out justice to the people and giving them their universal rights, the situation might not change. It is difficult to expect the perpetrator to deliver justice. There can be no peace without it.

Q. Kashmir has a two-decade long history of struggle and abuse. Yet, as you said in a 2010 interview when you tried to research on children in Kashmir you couldn’t find any material while there was plenty available on children in Palestine and Africa? Why this blackout?
A. Academically, there’s plenty going on internationally as far as Kashmir goes. But in India, there has been government propaganda and the conflict has been dubbed as a pan-Islamic struggle which is untrue. It’s probably why people choose to stay away and lap up the state version without ever questioning it. There have been fake encounters and the guilty have gone scot-free. There was a one hour encounter a few months ago where a mentally-challenged man, a Hindu, was declared an Islamic militant. Weapons and Pakistani currency were found on him. No one from the press questioned that. Eventually, two members of the security forces were arrested for having killed him for monetary incentives by the state. These stories never make it to news and the state propaganda is never challenged. These are some of the reasons why the blackout has continued. If one questions this, it is looked upon as anti-national.

Q. At another point you have said that friends at home have a hard time believing the extent of abuse in Kashmir at the hands of state authorities. What is the reason for this and how can it be addressed?
A. The reasons give above can be applied here too. This can only be addressed if journalists do their jobs without being a mouthpiece of the state. Facts and figures need to be challenged. It’s far from easy as journalists in the [Kashmir] Valley face daily violence for doing their job. The national media needs to step up and introspect on its role in the conflict and refuse to be used for propaganda. More researchers need to flock to the Valley and examine the long-term effects of militarisation and tell the truth about what India is responsible for.

Q. Would you agree that the issue of Kashmir doesn’t feature on the world’s radar as much as it should?
A. There are economic interests at play here. India is getting rich quickly at the cost of its poor. The world economy is in the dumps. Who would want to ruin their chances by picking a bone with one of the most dynamic markets? It’s simple — they [the international community] turn away when human rights are violated and we look away when they break the rules. It’s a convenient democracy. Last year, over 120 unarmed children and teenagers, the youngest being eight, were gunned down in the streets [of Kashmir] for protesting, and three months later the UN chief asked India to show restraint. This is outrageous. A year later, no one has been brought to book for the murders. Instead, the government compensated some victims. If these children were shot as they were perceived to be “enemies of the state,” then why did the government compensate them? No one is asking these questions. This is murder. If this happened in Mumbai, there’d be scores of candlelight marches for the victims.

Q. What are the challenges of reporting from Kashmir, in terms of freedom of movement, access to victims of abuse? Is there pressure to self-censor?
A. The challenges are immense. Photographers, videographers and reporters are targeted daily for covering news events. During curfew, movement is always problematic. A few weeks ago, a cameraman from the Associated Press and two local photographers were assaulted by security forces for doing their job. Last year, a reporter uploaded a video on Facebook where three boys were chased and killed in someone’s backyard. He was targeted by the police. Journalists who reported for Al Jazeera’s Kashmir page were also roughed up and intimidated by the forces. This is what happens in a militarised state. Where do you complain when the law-keepers become the lawbreakers? What can one expect in a state where the top police brass has been implicated in fake encounters and the illegal sale of weapons; and where the culture of impunity has been the order of the day for over two decades?

Q. Which stories would you like to work on in the future?
A. I work for a newspaper in Mumbai. It makes sense to work on in-depth stories that explore systemic issues that can be fixed in Mumbai and outside. The excuse that journalists usually hear that “This happens in all countries,” is not good enough. Unless you highlight the issues through stories and then debate them, they are not going to fix themselves. This is our job. Criticism and dissent are an inalienable right if this is a democracy. Let’s not settle for a democracy of convenience. I’m interested in pursuing stories on conflict over resources, environment, minority issues, human rights and women’s and children’s issues.

Jason Burke

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Jason Burke in Bajaur, Pakistan

Jason Burke in Bajaur, Pakistan. Photo Courtesy Jason Burke


With radical changes to the phenomenon of Islamic militancy in the past decade and the induction of hundreds of recruits globally, Jason Burke shares his findings, spanning over a decade, reflecting on what we’ve learnt after inglorious, if necessary, wars. In a new book, The 9/11 Wars, he focuses on ordinary people affected by the conflicts as well as on al-Qaeda as an “amorphous, dynamic and fragmented movement based more on personal relations and a shared world view than on formal membership of an organisation.” Here, Burke talks to the Herald about the Afghan endgame and the tenuous relations between Pakistan and the United States.

Q. You argue about the local versus the global and you’re cautious about the West’s policies when it comes to promoting democracy in the region. Has the lack of understanding been a failure on the part of policymakers or simply a political strategy of no engagement beyond a point?
A. There have been epic failures of policymaking during the 9/11 wars and the second failure has been of global thinking where human agencies have been written out. To understand this, look closely at how the West has viewed the Islamic world and then at how the Islamic world projects itself using the language of pan-Islamism. In the 1990s, the collapse of the major narrative of Communism and the Cold War led to the structuring of a new world order with radical Islamists. Take the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) in Pakistan which, since the last decade, has had enormous success in embedding its values in society but doesn’t get votes in an election. There is a need to understand why Pakistanis think the way they do to support the JI vision and how that thinking has emerged in the past decade: why they talk about veils, the role of Shariah within the legal system and other views such as why the US is the ‘bad guy’ and Jews are running the world. There is a religious component that is running the country, and that component is prevalent within the PPP [Pakistan Peoples Party] and PML–N [Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz] and Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf as well. Pakistan has changed since I was living there in the early 1990s and in a sense the classic political system has a religious, conservative thread. In a city like Karachi, it’s the middle classes now that have emerged with greater mobility of thought than 10 years ago, when a family that owned a motorbike at the time, now has a Suzuki Mehran. But ‘Middle Pakistan’ is more anti-American and religiously conservative today. There’s a consolidation of a more religious, and a moderately Islamist thread with a socially conservative tilt towards the Middle East. What happened to other countries in the central Middle East has happened to Pakistan in the past decade. A polarisation of consciousness since 9/11 has paid a considerable role. On her return to Pakistan, I was travelling with Benazir Bhutto to Islamabad from Peshawar, when she said to me, “Pakistan has changed, Mr Burke.” When Bhutto bought oranges at a roadside stall in Peshawar, she said she wasn’t aware of the prices that had changed. What Bhutto didn’t get when she returned to Pakistan after 10 years was how much it had changed. She must have picked up vibes and with her foreign backers, she had an idea of the problems when she spoke of human rights policies and letting in UN inspectors to visit nuclear plants but she wasn’t on the ground long enough to find out.

Q. Who are the drivers of global Islam today?
A. With al-Qaeda on the fringes, its influence waning and its worldview largely rejected, today, the actual drivers of global Islam are the urban middle classes. In countries like Iraq, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda has discredited itself by resorting to violent militancy, not acceptable to local populations. But in Pakistan, take the example of why Lashkar-e-Taiba went to Mumbai, because it was losing its grip on the jihadi movement at home. The last 10 years have generated a new strand of militancy in the Islamic world and Pakistan is acting like a pressure cooker for these variations. What you saw pre-2001 in Pakistan was local sectarianism and international/regional militancy in Kashmir and a bit of involvement in Afghanistan. But since then, all of this has become much more mixed, with new strands such as the Pakistani Taliban, which makes the situation in Pakistan fragmented and these groups able to escape the security establishment. This is a microcosm of a larger picture. There is an extra chaotic galaxy of militant cells now operating in the country.

Q. Diplomatic relations between the US and Pakistan remain volatile, with Washington wanting Pakistan to clamp down on the Haqqani network. What’s the nature of this relationship and how sustainable is it?
A. Pakistan and America remain in a complex relationship. They are not by any means natural allies, though there is a strange assumption in the West that this isn’t the case. Nothing indicates they are natural allies in terms of shared history, religion, a shared project or identity except the Cold War alliance. From the Pakistani side, why would the US be a natural ally? It doesn’t work for both sides.

Q. What of the stability of this region in the long term with the Afghan endgame?
A. India becomes a superpower because it’s growing at eight per cent per year and Pakistan will have no choice but to go along with this development. There will come a point when the weight of development and money will have a regional impact even if it takes decades. The strategic thinking in Islamabad is that the Indians will come across the border but the focus in India is on getting rich and not righting the wrongs of Partition. And Kashmir doesn’t dominate the news everyday in India either. As the endgame in Afghanistan nears, if the nightmare scenario is of total collapse with the Taliban controlling the south and the east and retaking Kabul, then the optimistic scenario is that aid keeps coming in and the Afghan army gets its act together to ensure stability and there’s some kind of Taliban representation in the government. In reality what will probably happen is something in the middle with the Taliban installing their government in the south and east of the country and inevitably be limited to pockets in the north. But the Taliban have internal rifts, so a return to the nasty, unstable and violent conflict-like situation before the West turned up is perhaps not going to happen. If Pakistan is thinking intelligently at this point, they will want good relations with Iran and a stable and prosperous Afghanistan with which it could share cordial relations and trade routes into Central Asia and not as a base of militancy. Until Pakistan’s security establishment works out that funding militant proxies is about conflict, not much will change. And can that happen? It would need an internal sea-change but geopolitical game-changers are not impossible.

Q. In your book, even as you conclude, there is sympathy with those whose lives have been wrecked by the war on terror, wherever in the world: civilians, soldiers, even failed suicide bombers. As a reporter travelling through these regions, what has gripped you the most?
A. A woman in Baghdad in 2004 with two disabled children aged seven and nine who needed special care. She was well-educated and her husband had been killed by the Baathists. She had limited resources and I saw how desperate her situation was at the time; that situation multiplied many times. If you put down how many people have lost their lives: civilians, army persons, combatants, militants, in Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and the rest of the world, the quarter of a million people and with hundreds of thousands injured, disabled, bereaved — it’s a huge figure to contend with.

Q. Do you see change in the cycle of violence and terrorism?
A. I wrote this book keeping in mind what this decade will look like and that the world has certainly changed. Al-Qaeda’s message and ideology has failed and been rejected by many communities; the Arab revolts are without al-Qaeda’s intervention and are a call for democracy. Even after engaging in wars costing trillions, western democracies like the US are still standing. There are no winners, no victories but lots of losers. Each individual war story, of the injured, the bereaved, the disabled, stories told by a US soldier or a failed suicide bomber who never really understood what he was doing, is a tragedy.