In this Article, Mayuri Khandelwal, a student of II year, Hidayatullah National Law University writes on reaction of people on social media with regards to destruction of terrorist camps in Myanmar by Indian army.

INTRODUCTION

This incident marks a shift in the policy of India against terrorism from doctrine of self-defense to the doctrine of hot pursuit[2]. This incident had an impact on the image of India in the international arena. The main point of contention was whether the attack was done after informing the military of Myanmar or not. Though there is no clear stance of government on this question but it appears as no prior consent of Myanmar was taken because any leak of information from their side could have resulted in the failure of the mission. It is notable here that India and Myanmar had a treaty to do cross-border terrorist encounter but only after informing the Myanmar government.

The incident is quite important because India sees itself as a vital player in the international legal order, and has for some time now been claiming a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council. Therefore, it is imperative that India is seen, within the community of nations, as a country that appreciates and respects the international legal system.

There were various reactions from different parts of the world as well as from India about this incident. The opinion of people differed widely following different arguments from morality to the legality of this act of the Indian army. An interesting observation here was that people from different regions had different views in respect of the incident which took place. The opinion was divided on the basis of their geographic location. Also, there is unrest in the whole of south East Asia after this incident. There were reactions from Pakistan both from the leaders as well as the masses.  The shift in India’s counter-terrorism policy made the leaders of neighboring nation awestricken.

There was also a lot of politics done on this issue both by BJP and other opposition parties. On one side by appreciating the prime minister the ministers in the government posed a problem for the government as the legality of this act is still in question. While the opposition also should not have spoken against the government considering the sensitivity of the issue. The regional parties of the northeast also stated their stand on the incident.[3] There is suspense on the fact that whether the attack was done to stop the terrorist activities or was just done for killings of the 18 Indian army personnel. The project will discuss all these aspects and point of view of the people on social media about these issues.

Analysis

The analysis given below are based on the comments mentioned on the Page ADGPI- Indian army[4]

Social networking site- Facebook

The page is the official Indian army page on Facebook and after the operation of the Indian army in Myanmar, it posted a status on the same evening that how in view of the imminent threat, an immediate response based on intelligence, operations were conducted to counter these planned assaults. The post received a large number of responses through comment. More than 2500 people commented on the post. People who commented were mostly Indians probably because the page belonged to the Indian army.

The responses received on this page were mostly in appreciation of the act done by the Indian army. This could also be because of the reason that the people who have liked the page are probably fans of Indian army and hence have liked the page. The act done by the army was indeed of unmatched bravery and it is very logical that every person who likes the page will like this operation of the army.

The regional difference also was not that evident on this page. People from different regions and religions seemed to be united. The people from The North-east also responded to this post. Surprisingly they did not comment anything against the Indian army or the atrocities done by the army in their region. They, in fact, were of the opinion that terrorism is the reason for the backwardness of their region. But there were two responses which were against the army operation and tried to bring the attention of other people on the atrocities faced by them. One of them belonged to Manipur and other from Nagaland.[5] The people from other regions of the North-east doesn’t seem to have a problem with the Indian army as such. The main argument was why India does not impose draconian law in mainland India and only in the North-east. He then quotes Indian Army Chief that they are against using AFSPA in troubled areas in the mainland as they are the citizens. Continuing the same line of argument he says that attacks in Chhattisgarh were more brutal than this attack which killed 76 of the armed forces people. But the government was not harsh on the local people as they were on the northeastern people.

The arguments made by these people were not a reaction to the Myanmar attack, but they were just fed up of AFSPA[6]. They didn’t comment on the attack on the terrorist in Myanmar but were rather concerned about the racial discrimination done to them by the government and the people of the mainland of the country.

This also shows that how people try to stereotype whole of a community or religion on the basis of the opinion of few people. Like in the present case only two people out of fifty plus north east people who commented on the page were not happy with the actions of the army in their area. But most of them blamed terrorist for the backwardness of their area.

Social networking site – Facebook

The analysis given below are based on the comments mentioned on the Page Test Cracker[7]

The page is a general knowledge page created for the purpose of preparation for various entrance exams and government job exams. Various kind of students who prepare for IAS/ IPS, CLAT, etc are a part of this page. It provides the students with the daily dose of current affairs which are generally asked in these type of exams.

The news on Indian army killing terrorist in Myanmar was also published on this page. The page received responses from nearly five hundred plus people and interestingly most of the people commenting were from the northeast. The trend of reactions of people other than that of north-east remained the same. They were quite enthusiastic about the success of Indian army in the operation.

The stand of the people from north-east changed considerably on this page. Leaving a single person who supported Indian army all others seemed in opposition of the army and tried to criticize their act in all possible ways. The majority opinion was that the operation was fake, and army failed miserably in Myanmar and did not kill even a single terrorist. According to them, the army was incompetent of killing any terrorist and could only kill the innocent people of the north-east. Thereby their comments tried to express the brutality done by the army in their region and how the central government is not bothered about the problems in their areas. Some students from Nagaland went up to the extent of saying that they were forcibly being made part of India and should be granted freedom otherwise these killings of army persons will not stop in that area. Some went to the extent of asking that why are the people struggling for the freedom of north-east labeled as a terrorist if the people who struggled for the same in 1947 were labeled as freedom fighters.

While these people wanted to show their pain and anguish against the army the people from other parts of India replied to the comments in much uncivilized manner thinking it to be patriotic and further increasing the tension and hatred among them. Using such language and trying to suppress the voice which they think to be anti-national does not in any manner benefit the country. Having such hatred for the citizens of the same country cannot be said as patriotism. Saying that they should leave the country if they don’t respect it is not a solution. The people whom they consider to be of mainland behave in such a way that they are ought to believe that they are not an integral part of the country.

Social networking site- Twitter

The analysis given below are based on the comments mentioned on thePage Trending- #myanmarstrikes by Indian army[8]

The Tweet was done by Saikat Datta on his two-part series on the MyanmarStrikes by Indian Special Forces. The topic of discussion was how India has confused a successful military operation by political messaging. It was a healthy discussion on how India still does not know to best use special operations to further its long-term objectives. By making some irresponsible statements, the politicians of India themselves conceived the point that they violated the International law. This declaration was unnecessary as India has never involved itself in hot pursuit rather has always covered all its attack under the doctrine of self-defense. The operation was unnecessarily disclosed to get public support rather Indian government should have never admitted openly about this incidence. Most of the people in the discussion were of the same opinion leaving some fanatic followers of BJP who were just congratulating Modi for the bold step taken and were not interested in giving any relevant counter to the point of discussion. They also said that the act was justified on the account that even U.S. and Israel uses the same tactics for fighting terrorism. But the point still remains that India wants a permanent seat in the Security Council, and this act can have some disastrous effect on India’s claim. This discussion was less about the operation and more about the politics behind the operation and thinking of the possibilities that such attacks would have taken place earlier also, but the information may not have been leaked. This act of Indian government has also put into questioned the sovereignty of Myanmar. This could also affect the relations between the two neighboring countries.

Social networking site- Reddit

Topic- Fake pics of the operation by government news channel[9]

The operation of the army got into more controversy when ANI news channel showed pictures of the operation in which the faces of the army personnel were blurred but then they turned out to be old photos of the year 2009.  The very common response received on this page was that whether the operation really happened or it was also fake like the pictures which were passed by the official defense website to the news channels. Some people were of the opinion that the government should not be held responsible for the mistake of news channel.[10]  The Pakistani social networking forum siasat.pk also took up this matter of the fake pictures and Indian army was heavily criticized by the people of Pakistan questioning the authenticity of the operation. The news channel probably in the quest of delivering news before their competitors, latched on to the pictures without probing any further. I don’t think that the army or the government should be blamed for such goof up by the media though it gave everyone a chance to criticize the government. Though the chest thumping by the ministers of the government over the issue needs to be criticized.

The analysis given below are based on the comments mentioned on the Social networking site – Siasat.pk[11]

Topic- Myanmar rejects Indian claim, says operation on militants was on the Indian side of the border.

The site is Pakistani social discussion forum which discusses all national and international issues. The views expressed are mainly in Urdu and English and all most all the people in the discussion are Pakistani. The neighbors were worried after the operation of the Indian army. After Myanmar had rejected the claim, which was a very obvious thing from Myanmar’s side and was probably false, the Pakistan people got a chance to mock over India’s operation.

The language used is not very decent on the forum and nothing much substantive was said on the thread other than abusing Indian army and the people of the country. The allegations were on the Indian army that it can only attack smaller nations and want to establish itself as a superpower by exploiting the small nations of south Asia. Also, Pakistan is not Myanmar, and it will not tolerate any such attack on their soil.

The fear could be easily seen in the people of Pakistan after this operation. Though they tried to insult the Indian army but their arguments lacked logical consistency. It seemed they were criticizing the army just to criticize and lacked rationale.

Conclusion

Online social media have gained astounding worldwide growth and popularity which has led to attracting attention from a variety of researchers globally. Although with time all generations have come to embrace the changes social network has brought about, teenagers and young adults are the most fanatic users of these sites. Of all the sites analyzed in this project, the type of discussions and views differ. On the official army page there was very less criticism of the army and even the north-eastern people were not against the army. But when we looked at the comments on an academic page the views of the people differed. This was because of the type of people affiliated with one of the pages. The administrator of a social networking site has his own biases, and people who will be a part of that page will probably have the same orientation as the administrator.

The stereotyping of people that is done on social media is flawed in the sense that when people go on stereotyping others they start looking at those places where that particular community will make that kind of comments.For instance, if we will see the comment of Muslim people of our country on the page of some anti-national leader the views expressed will be more likely anti-national. That does not mean that whole community holds such a view. Similarly, on the official page of Indian army many people from north-east were supporter of Indian army which we fail to see. Also while examining the Pakistani site the people who were expressing the view had clear objective in mind i.e. to try and criticize India.  So it can also be concluded that for any healthy discussion it is necessary to see that the people have their biases before an incident takes place and the review of that incident is always influenced by their biases.

The subversion of law is also examined differently by different people. For some it was a good and brave act, for others India could have long term disadvantages by doing such operations. All these opinions are formed from the understanding of people about a particular issue and on social media not many are keen to learn or respect the understanding of other people rather try to force their understanding of the issue on others.

[1]Government unhappy with Rajyavardhan Rathore’s remark that Army entered Myanmar for covert strike, Times of India availabale at http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/47635425.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst, last seen on 16/08/2015.

[2]Ibid.

[3]Ibid.

[4]ADGPI- Indian Army, Facebook available at https://www.facebook.com/Indianarmy.adgpi/posts/383413671855268, last seen on 16/08/2015.

[5]Ibid.

[6]Testcracker, Facebook available at https://www.facebook.com/TestCracker/posts/954048344615647:0 last seen on 16/08/2015.

[7]Ibid.

[8]#myanmarstrikes,Twitter at https://twitter.com/hashtag/myanmarstrikes, last seen on 16/08/2015.r

[9]Indian Army Myanmar Operation Photos Are Fake. The Media Fooled Us All, Topyas available at http://topyaps.com/indian-army-photos, last seen on 16/08/2015.

[10]Indian Special forces have just concluded an OP in Myanmar to kill the terrorists [Unverified], Reddit available at https://www.reddit.com/r/india/comments/395hhg/indian_special_forces_have_just_concluded_an_op/,

last seen on 16/08/2015.

[11]Myanmar rejects Indian claim, says operation on militants was on Indian side of border, Sisyasat available at http://www.siasat.pk/forum/showthread.php?353628-Myanmar-rejects-Indian-claim-says-operation-on-militants-was-on-Indian-side-of-border, last seen on 16/08/2015.