Numerous articles covering the life of Kashmiri Muslims can be found regularly on the BBC. There is little to no coverage on the lives of Pakistani and Bangladeshi Hindus.
During 2021, when Muslim extremists were rampaging through Bangladesh, killing Hindus, a very small number of articles gave them coverage.
It took almost a week for the BBC to muster an article on the issue, and even this made biased assertions. The article claimed that the rise of Hindu politics in India was angering Bangladeshi Muslims. It is well documented that attacks on Bangladeshi Hindus have long surpassed recent politics in India and spans decades.
To present such a random view sets a completely different narrative. It appears that where Hindus are the victims, it is suggested this is their own fault. The narrative appears that Hindus can only be the villain.
The BBC covered Mohammad Shami, an Indian Muslim cricketer, when he was trolled online for performing badly in a match, without referencing claims in India that posts had come from Pakistan.
When Bangladeshi Hindu cricketer Liton Das was abused online by Islamists, there was no coverage. The BBC also did not cover Danish Kaneria, one of the few Hindus to play cricket for Pakistan. Kaneria said that he was coaxed to convert to Islam and other cricketers like Shahid Afridi refused to eat with him.
In 2020, when two Hindu sadhus (ascetics) were brutally lynched, the BBC carried an article incorrectly calling them “godmen”. Whether intentional or more poor source checking, terming them as godmen, a negative and cynical term, took away from the fact two Hindus were murdered.
It also fails to mention police were present and watching the incident taking place. The BBC almost vindicates the police saying “The viral video shows the mob lynching the men as police struggled to rescue them”. The BBC must have seen a very different video as the same police were suspended for dereliction of duty.
In 2023, the BBC covered that a Muslim student was allegedly attacked for getting his times tables wrong. The article gave no context as to whether the teacher told other students to slap him because the student was Muslim or because he failed his times tables.
On the exact same day another story was covered across India of Muslim teachers being accused of beating up a Hindu student for writing “Jai Shri Ram”, a common Hindu prayer or chant. This was not covered on BBC India for balance.
References for this article can be found in the full report.
