Emboldened by their united resistance against the Gen Pervez Musharraf's military regime, Pakistan's scribes believe they are more stronger than their Indian counterparts, but lament the absence of leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru to enable democracy take roots.A team of visiting young Pakistani journalists believe that the Pakistan media had become a shade stronger than its Indian counterpart by standing up to the Musharraf's regime as well as the Emergency imposed by him recently to clamp down on the media and the judiciary."We are very critical of our government even during Emergencies. Whereas, the Indian media is either pro or anti-government. They have affiliations and some papers have their own editorial policies and corporate interests," they said in Chennai on Tuesday.The journalists, here under an Indo-Pak Exchange Programme organised by Panos South Asia, an NGO that works with South Asian media, also felt the Indian media had not highlighted the ‘human rights violations’ by security forces in Kashmir.At the same time they had a word of praise for Indian democracy. "Jawaharlal Nehru laid the foundation for democracy in India. Whereas in Pakistan, there was a vacuum after the death of Mohammed Ali Jinnah as there was no strong leader after him," they said."In Pakistan we don't have Leftist forces to counter right and central forces. In India, you have strong Left forces to sustain democracy," they added.They said the Pakistani media played the role of the opposition to fill the vacuum left by political parties which were marginalised by the successive military dictatorships.
