『人類学研究所 研究論集』第 5 号（2017）

Indian Ocean Tsunami in Indian Media
Gopalan Ravindran 14

Abstract
Tsunami entered the public sphere in India as a word that evokes unprecedented calamity
after December 26 2004 when the Indian Ocean Tsunami caused massive devastation in the
coastal districts of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. Tamil Nadu was the worst
affected state with more than 7000 deaths. Even though, Tsunamis of higher magnitudes
washed away large chunks of ancient Tamil Nadu, according to references in Sangam
literature 15, the 2004 Tsunami's social, cultural and economic implications warrant a closer
and critical study. In particular, the characteristics and implications of the manner in which
the Indian media dealt with the disaster require a critical examination. This paper examines
the same with a view to uncover the merits and demerits of the approaches adopted by Indian
media towards the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami.
Keywords : Indian Ocean Tsunami, Indian Media, Tamil Nadu, Rational and Fictionalised
Narratives, Violations of Privacy, Benevolence
Introduction
The Indian Ocean Tsunami hit the Eastern and Western coasts of India on the morning ofDecember 26 2004. The worst affected state was Tamil Nadu and its worst affected district
was Nagapatinam. According to official reports in January 2005, 7,707 people died in Tamil
Nadu and 5,819 people died in the district of Nagapatinam. One of the worst affected cities
was Chennai. Chennai has the world's second longest beach. On that fateful day, many
children were playing cricket and other games and they became victims when giant waves
struck the Marina beach. 206 people died in Chennai alone. According to Bharathi, thePresident of South Indian Fishermen's Welfare Association, the government, media and NGOs
were unprepared for the disaster and were responding slowly in the immediate aftermath ofthe disaster. Said Bharathi (2016), “Tsunami was unexpected and when it hit the fishingcommunities, it was a disaster. Piles of bodies were waiting to be buried. Govt did not act forthree days. Media did report the magnitude of disaster. But it was disrespectful to the privacyof the dead persons by showing women and children's bodies in close up, some time hanging

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Professor/Head, Dept.of Journalism and Communication, University of Madras, India.
Sangam literature refers to the earliest available ancient Tamil literature (2381 poems on thedomains of love and heroism by 473 poets) that belongs to the last of the three Sangams (Academies).
The third Sangam period covers 300 BC – 300 AD. The works made possible by the first two
academies were lost during the earlier periods when unprecedented deluge washed away large parts of
the Tamil country.
15

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Research Paper of the Anthropological Institute Vol.5 (2017)

down from trees. They were reporting the disaster, but in violation of ethical limits ofreporting.”
The Indian Ocean Tsunami and the Indian Media Disaster: News without “Objective
Criteria”
According to Walter Lippmann (1922/1927), the “objective criteria” is an important
arbiter of news. Walter Lippmann wanted the “objective criteria” to succeed for the wellbeingof the citizens and their relationship with institutions in society. This was not to be in histimes and this is not to be in our times, particularly in countries like India and during timesof disasters like the 2004 Tsunami. According to Lippmann, another important parameter ofnews is it must “signalise the event”. In the case of the coverage of the Indian Ocean Tsunami,
this happened, but happened badly, to say the least, in terms of the parameters of the coveragegiven by Indian media, particularly the vernacular newspapers in the worst affect state ofTamil Nadu.
Indian media includes, besides television, films and radio, its dominant category, Indianpress. At last count, there are hundreds of FM radio stations, Public Service Broadcaster, All
India Radio's stations and nearly 900 television channels, besides the Indian film industry
which produces more than 1000 films every year. Indian Press is the familiar tag for relating
to India's newspapers, magazines and other periodicals. The Registrar of Newspapers for
India (RNI) reports in its 2015-16 report that there are 16,136 newspapers in the total list of
publications of 110,851. The growth percentage was 5.13% over the previous year
(www.rni.nic.in).
But these wide spectrum of Indian media have the propensity for violating the dictum ofWalter Lippmann's “objective criteria” not because they glamour for it, but because of theircultural legacies. One important cultural attribute of public communication through media isthe dominance of orality vis a vis print-based literacy. The second important attribute is thepower of epic narratives in their fictionalised and non-fictionalised versions in Indian media.
We can see their power and influence in the popularity of Indian films and the popularity of
television serials as well as in the success of newspapers which have institutionalised themvis a vis newspapers which want to follow Western modes of news narratives. Dina Thanthi,
the popular newspaper in Tamil has institutionalised both the attributes as news gathering andnews reporting practices and remains numero uno because of the same.
Ravindran (2015) argued that the local cultural norms are the primary definers of thecharacteristics of the different sections of the Indian press. He remarked: “the characteristicsof the different constituents of Indian press underscore the primacy of the local cultural norms
as the primary definers of their characteristics even as the tendencies to follow the universal
norms of journalism are in place, albeit ephemerally. Undoubtedly, this makes the individual
entities in the canvas of the Indian press more local and less-pan Indian; more discursive andless homogenous. In the process, the canvas itself turns out to be a misnomer.”36

『人類学研究所 研究論集』第 5 号（2017）

This paper takes as its theoretical framework Walter Lippmann's conceptions of news,
news event and the objective criteria. According to Walter Lippmann, as mentioned earlier,news is news because of its “objective criteria”. News is news because of its potential tosignalise the event as the news event.

In his frameworks, contained in his three famous

works on journalism and public opinion (Public Opinion, Liberty and News and Phantom
Public), he clearly argues the cause of a democratic and eventful relationship between media,
citizens and the modern society. Said Lippmann: “The hypothesis, which seems to me themost fertile, is that news and truth are not the same thing, and must be clearly distinguished.
The function of news is to signalise an event, the function of truth is to bring to light thehidden facts, to set them into relation with each other, and make a picture of reality on which
men can act. Only at those points, where social conditions take recognisable and measurable
shape, do the body of truth and the body of news coincide. …Therefore on the whole, thequality of the news about modern society is an index of its social organisation. The better the
institutions, the more all interests concerned are represented, the more issues are disentangled,
the more objective criteria are introduced, the more perfectly an affair can be reported as
news.”
This paper seeks to see the coverage of the Indian Ocean Tsunami

by the Indian media

as a relationship that is an index of social organisation where, as Lippmann says “all interests
concerned are represented, more issues are disentangled, more objective criteria are
introduced, more perfectly an affair can be reported as news. With is in perspective, this paper
locates and co-locates the following as the salient characteristics of the Indian

media'srelationship with the Indian ocean Tsunami.
I)

Fictionalising Disaster Narratives

II) Violations of Privacy - Insensitive Photojournalism
III) Memorialising Indian Ocean Tsunami through epic/emotional narratives andrational/false narratives
IV) Constructing acts of Benevolence by the State and NGOs as News.
V) Media Coverage in the Pre-Social Media and Pre-24 Hour News Channels Age
Fictionalising Disaster Narratives
One of the dominant tendencies of the Indian media, particularly its vernacular wing is
the propensity to fictionalise news or cultivate partisan news narratives. As per the tenets ofjournalism of the Western kind, fictionalising narratives is an act that is seen as antitheticalto the tenets of journalism. Journalism is a derivative of the more than 400 year old print
culture in India and it is still struggling to compete with the tenets of the strong oral culture.
Epic narratives are the hall mark of Indian oral culture and they have permeated the domainsof journalism with ease. Epic narratives also militate against the rational narratives and“objective criteria” which seek to convey news as news without invoking the tools of37

Research Paper of the Anthropological Institute Vol.5 (2017)

emotions laden storytelling for news presentation.
The Indian Ocean Tsunmai was not a natural disaster for many of the Tamil newspapers.
They sought to portray it as a monster with a human personae. The relationship between thedisaster as a news event and the newspapers was subverted in the process through the
deployment of stories that were anchored by headlines such as "The waves that were sleeping
silently became very angry that day and rose higher" (Dinamalar). Another Tamil daily, Dina
Thanthi headlined on 26 Dec.2014, "People Came to Realise that there was a cruel monster,
Tsunami, when it gathered and swallowed hundreds and thousands of people".
Violations of Privacy - Insensitive Photojournalism
The photos of the victims of 9/11 did not appear either in the media of USA or othercountries. But the close up shots of the victims of Tsunami 2004 appeared in a gruesomemanner in Indian media, particularly the vernacular newspapers. Such a senseless coveragekilled the victims and their living ones many a time. Some photojournalists even prided
themselves for winning award for their photographs. The absence of a media regulator in
India is one of the fundamental reasons for the insensitive practices of photojournalism during
times of disaster. Mr Sheikh Thawood, a local fishermen was aghast when he said: "Tsunami
was covered not in the manner befitting the ethical standards of journalism. There were notmany television channels as they are now. But the media were violating the victims' privacy
in a shocking manner. These violations could have been avoided. Tsunami was a natural
disaster that was also a media disaster in this respect" (2016).
Memorialising Tsunami : Emotional/Epic Narratives and Rational/False Narratives
Emotional/Epic Narratives
There is an interesting theoretical take on memorialising rhetoric as a material marker inthe growing body of literature on material rhetorics. The work of Dickinson (2010) is ofparticular relevance in this paper which seeks to see the manner in which the public sites ofIndian media sought to memorialise a natural disaster, the Indian Ocean Tsunami. Majority
of Indian newspapers have been engaging in memorialising the Indian Ocean 2004 Tsunami
and its victims almost every year. The vernacular newspapers, particularly Tamil newspapers
are known for churning out emotional narratives and fictionalised headlines on the eve of
Tsunami anniversaries. Dinamalar, for instance, had this headline, on 25 Dec.2016. "Tsunamithat Gathered and Gobbled Up in its Mouth". On 26 Dec.2014, the same paper had thisheadline: "The Tsunami That Swallowed the Lives of 228,000 Lives…" Another leading
Tamil daily, Dina Thanthi's words were no different. It headlined on 26 Dec.2014, "Peoplecame to realise that there was a cruel monster, Tsunami, when it gathered and swallowed
hundreds and thousands of people." It had the classical epic narrative form. This story is about
the Tenth anniversary of Tsunami tragedy. But this story adopts the epic narrative form in that38

『人類学研究所 研究論集』第 5 号（2017）it does not talk about the anniversary to begin with, rather it recapitulates the tragic events
that befell people when Tsunami struck Tamil Nadu. It seeks to attribute a monstrous personae
to the natural disaster when it said: "The waves that rose up in Chennai's marina beach
gobbled up people, shops and things and dragged them inside the sea."On the other hand, the English mainstream dailies such as Times of India had a different
approach when it sought to memorialise the tragedy. For instance, on 26 Dec.2018, Times ofIndia had a plain headline, "Tsunami Fourth Anniversary." for its photo essay on womenoffering prayers to sand replicas of victims on the city's marina beach, where many perishedon that day, particularly children playing cricket and other games.
Rational/False Narratives
Dinamani, a Tamil daily had this story on 04 09 2016: "04 09 1596: The Date when
Tsunami Struck Japan for the first time." The headline seems false, compared to the content
which says that it was the date when the first recorded Tsunami hit Kyushu coast in Japan.
This proves the carelessness in the journalistic practice, editing, when it comes to disaster
reporting by Indian media.
As is their wont, Indian newspapers also capitalised on the event by bringing out special
books and contacting the celebrities to launch them or promote them. A well known case inthis respect was the special Tsunami book brought out by Times of India to mark the firstanniversary. Its edition on 25 Dec. 2005 had this headline: "Tsunami Anniversary: President
APJ Abdul Kalam Speaks." It said : We didn't want to revisit the death and destruction; wewanted to look at the positives emerging from this tandava — death and birth form thecontinuum of life, don't they?. It quoted the man who is regarded as the People's President ofIndia, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.
"You see, the media has covered the tsunami quite exhaustively. But it has focused on
the devastation, on death and destruction. I have followed the aftermath of the tsunami very
closely. I have seen how people are rebuilding their lives. I am from Tamil Nadu and I am
familiar with these people. One thing that has struck me is the response of people a few
kilometres away from the shore, who were not affected by the monster wave. Do you knowwhat was their first reaction? They rushed to the affected areas with food, clothes andmedicines. This is in sharp contrast to what happened recently when riots broke out (inanother part of the world) in the wake of a natural calamity. Perhaps not everything is rightwith India, but it has some positive civilisational values. I think this is one of them — ourability to come to the help of those afflicted."Media Coverage in the Pre-Social Media and Pre-24 Hour News Channels Age
Looking back on the coverage from the vantage point of social media and 24 hour news
channels, it is apparent that the absence of the social media probably was a handicap in39

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disaster communication during the last Tsunami days. Going by the recent experience of Dec
2015 Chennai floods, when youth of the city were mobilised and inspired by the messages onsocial media in their historical work in saving lives, providing relief to people, the presenceof social media during the last Tsunami could have provided better communication means andrelief efforts. The absence of 24 hour news channels can be read as a positive as the same did
not provide what the social media provided. Moreover, the sensationalising tendency of the
24 hour Indian Television channels would have created a havoc of violations of privacy ofthe dead individuals.
Constructing Acts of Benevolence by the State and NGOs as News
This paper examines the acts of benevolence that emanated from the sides of the State,
NGOs and media from a critical theory perspective. The notions of benevolence andbenevolent subjectivity have been serving as important theoretical constructs in relating to
the conditions of subalterneity in diverse cultural contexts. Gayatri Spivak’s theoreticaladdresses (Landry and MacLean, 1996) concerning the above have elevated the purportedly
centuries-old feudal marker of benevolence into a post colonial marker par excellence. This
seems not only a theoretically sound mode of understanding the conditions of subalterneity
and their sources, but a pragmatic one as well, particularly in the post colonial contexts ofcountries like India. The markers of post coloniality in such contexts are as widely populated
as the subaltern groups and their detractors. The public spheres in which these divergent
markers of post coloniality are made visible and influential are structured by the subalterngroups and their detractors in an intensely collaborative mode. One such public sphere is
Tamil cinema. This is the plane where celebrity colonialism finds its subaltern subjects, theTamil film fans. This is the plane where the formation of subalterneity hinges more upon theformation of benevolent subjectivities of the stars and super stars of Tamil cinema than thereal world conditions in which subalterns find themselves.
The rhetoric of benevolence, kindness and solidarity was in the air in the days after
Tsunami for a few years. It was the first major disaster in the post-Independent India on theeast coast of India, particularly in states like Tamil Nadu. It was the first disaster in the ageof modern globalisation. This particular nature of Tsunami 2004 had the three salient markers
of benevolence, kindness and solidarity in the rhetoric of the media agenda, state agenda andthe NGO's agenda. But how these translated into real benevolence, kindness and solidarity isa moot question. According to Shiekh, a fisherman from Pazhaverkadu fishing region, theNGOs contributed in both positive and negative terms. He said, "A few aid agencies did goodwork, in providing relief to the affected people. But many profited. For example, one agency
approached our village for setting up a relief camp on long term basis and they wanted 3 centsland. Now they are owning 30 cents in our village. They did nothing. We are unable to getback the land. Women, who were inside their homes, could come out in the open, thanks toaid agencies who provided them means of empowerment. The arrival of fibre boats with the40

『人類学研究所 研究論集』第 5 号（2017）aid agencies changed the practices we were used to and our relationship with the sole meansof fishing for several decades and centuries, the wooden boat. Now the landscape is filledwith fibre boats. They are not good in the tropical environment and bodies become hot in the
hot weather sailing these fibre boats. They also remain wet throughout. Wooden boats aredifferent, they are not hot, they do not topple and they are not wet always. School children
have grown in number, thanks to the Govt. initiatives after Tsunami.”
There were three kinds of acts of benevolence as exhibited by the State and NGOs. The
State agencies wanted to be the sole players in reaching out to the families affected with aid.
In one instance, Dinakaran reported on 01 Jan.2005 the ban by the Tamil Nadu government
on NGOs distributing aid directly.

The second kind of benevolence is when the party leader

who presides over the government as Chief Minister wants to be the only person who can be
benevolent and guarantor for the bright future lives of the victims' families. On 22 Dec.2004,
Dinakaran reported the benevolent message of the Chief Minister, Ms Jayalalitha: “Do Not
Worry About Your Future.”
She was repeating this again, according to another Tamil daily, Malai Malar (31Dec.2004), “No One Should Worry About Anything”. The third kind of benevolence was
exhibited by those who were insiders in media trade. The most notable of the insiders were
film and television stars. They often exhibit their love for helping out the needy and those
who are affected by disasters. But, they ironically take recourse to collecting money frompeople rather than putting their wealth for public good. Their act of benevolence is the mostdubious. Dinamalar had this headline on 01 Jan.2004, “Film Actors and Actresses Collect
Donation”.
Conclusion
This paper argued that Indian media failed the test of Walter Lippmann's “objective
criteria” and his call for relating to the relationship between news media and events as a siteof a positive social organisation. The paper located and co-located the five characteristics ofIndian media in their relationship with the Indian Ocean Tsunami. This paper acknowledges
the need for divergent theoretical frameworks to engage with disaster communication.
References
Bharathi. K.
2016. Personal Interview. September 27, 2016.
Dickinson, Greg, Blair, Carole and Ott.Brian
2010. The Places of Public Memory:The Rhetoric of Museums and Memorials, Universityof Alabama Press.
Landry, Donna and MacLean, Gerald
1996. The Spivak Reader: Selected Works of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Literary

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Criticism.
Lippmann, Walter,
1922. Public Opinion, Harcourt, Brace and Co., NY.
1927. Phantom Public, Macmillan, NY,
Ravindran, Gopalan
2015. “The 2014 Indian Election and Partisan and Fictional Narratives in the Tamil
Language Press” in Thorsen, Einar and Sreedharan, Chindu (Ed.), India Election
2014: First Reflections, Bournemouth University.
Sheikh, Thawood
2016. Personal Interview, September 27 2016.
The Registrar of Newspapers for India (RNI), www.rni.nic.in

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