‘Waited Hrs to Send a Story’: How Media Worked Under J&K Lockdown
The facilitation centre set up in Srinagar was a good thing, if only the facilities were up to the mark.
advertisement
Video Editor: Vishal Kumar
A reporter stationed in Jammu and Kashmir to cover the situation after the abrogation of Article 370 was playing a game on his mobile phone. When asked why, he said this was all he could do till the internet was restored.
Until communication lines and internet were restored in Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday, 17 August, journalists struggled to transmit the reports back to their offices.
Bashaarat Masood, a journalist with The India Express, said reporters faced a lot of difficulties. They had to send pen drives to Delhi, sometimes even written notes through a contact, who would then type it out to send it to the editors.
The facilitation centre set up in Srinagar was a good thing, if only the facilities were up to the mark.
HOW USEFUL IS THE MEDIA CENTRE?
The Jammu and Kashmir administration had set up a media centre in Srinagar with an active phone and internet connection for journalists so that they can file their stories. But did it help?
Naseer Ganai, a senior correspondent working for Outlook India said when they opened the media centre there were only four computers. People had to wait long for their turn. On top of that, the internet was very slow.
"It would take hours to mail a story. The mail would crash sometimes, so we had to call someone to fix it. So we wrote our stories, took it in our pen drive and came to the centre. If we could, then we mailed it," Ganai said.
The reporters claimed that the net connectivity was anything but smooth, with speeds lower than 2G, making it a time-consuming task.
Masood, The Indian Express reported, said he had to wait for four hours for the internet connection to be restored so he could send a story.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)