At about 5 pm yesterday, Times Now tweeted that Pakistan had denied visas to the channel’s team to cover External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s visit to Islamabad, raising yet more questions on the Pakistani administration’s penchant for blocking critical voices in the media. (Times Now is known for its antagonist stance against Pakistani administration and its support to terror.)
Times Now stated the channel had been “blocked” from covering the visit.
Pakistan denies visa to @TimesNow team, blocks channel from covering Sushma Swaraj's visit to the country.
— TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) December 8, 2015
However, the Press Attaché at Pakistan High Commission in India Manzoor Ali Memon has denied Times Now’s claims. Memon, in a phone conversation with Newslaundry, said they could not process Times Now’s visa request in time since the application was incomplete.
Memon said Times Now was misleading people and questioned the channels “anti-peace” activities. “The Indian government announced the visit on Monday afternoon. We had less than 24 hours to process various requests from media organisations, yet we tried to accommodate everyone,” said Memon. “We received the application of the Times Now journalist on Monday at around 9:30 pm, we never denied them, we told them their application is incomplete. Despite that we were still trying to process it,” he added. Memon further said the Times Now journalist had not submitted four photographs that were necessary to process the visa request and that his form was incomplete.
“Yeh [Times Now] anti-peace hisaab kitaab kartein hain, yeh nahin chahte aman ho mulk main [they don’t want the two nations to come together],” said Memon, claiming that Times Now has an established bureau in Islamabad so there’s no question of blocking the channel.
Memon also said Times Now aired a joint TV programme with Geo TV last night. “We have issued them uplinking facility and allowed them to uplink their programme from Pakistan. How can they say we are denying them anything?”
Times Now did air a joint TV programme on Tuesday night. The channel tweeted about it an hour after the broadcast that it had been blocked from covering Sushma Swaraj’s trip.
LIVE NOW: A Times Now-Geo TV broadcast: Will Pak give peace a chance? #IndoPakIceBreaker
— TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) December 8, 2015
Newslaundry reached out to Times Now Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami for his response to Memon’s assertions. Goswami stated that the Press Attache’s statements were unadulterated rubbish. “Our correspondent’s passport was returned this morning. No communication was made to our correspondent regarding incomplete forms. Forms which were made available by the Pakistan High Commission were duly filled along with all other Indian media houses. In the form, there is an entry for local contact which, as per the instruction to the media, was entered in as the Marriot Hotel in Islamabad. Our application was as detailed as any application can be,” said Goswami. He also added that Pakistan High Commission had made a direct attempt to sabotage any effort by Times Now to cover Sushma Swaraj’s visit.
“They were holding on to our passport so there was no way we could have gone to Pakistan. Even if the visa permission had been granted, there was no way for our reporter to travel since they had our passports,” said Goswami, adding that he need not explain his editorial position to any officer in the Pakistani government.
Goswami further stated that Times Now is on the front foot when questioning Pakistan’s support to terror and is not part of the “cottage industry that is soft to Pakistani establishment”. “As for permission to do a show with Geo TV, it our right. We all know what the Pakistani government did to Geo TV. Uplinking from Pakistan is not a favour, it is a right of every news organisation. They cannot single out Times Now in that. Thank god for small mercies.”
Goswami asserted that it makes no sense that channels “with one-fifth of our viewership” have been given visas. He said that there was indeed a freelance journalist in Pakistan who contributes to Times Now, but they don’t have a journalist on the pay rolls there. “Besides we needed an Indian journalist to cover the visit.”
Meanwhile, it appears that not just Times Now, but CNN IBN and NewsX were also unable to secure visas to cover the visit. The channels that managed visas include ABP News, NDTV, India Today and India TV, among others. It is difficult to say anecdotally from the list of channels allowed permission whether a bias from the Pakistani side was at play. But Times Now does have a reputation for a hawkish stance towards Pakistan. That the channel has now been denied permission over what seems flimsy grounds may be an upshot of that. It only strengthens the perception that Pakistani establishment shies away from debates that make it uncomfortable.
