‘ Satrah Din, Satrah Saal ’ : Media, Propaganda and Virtual Warfare in the India-Pakistan War of 1965

AbstractThe 1965 India-Pakistan War, also known as the Second Kashmir War or the ‘Seventeen-Day War’, is usually understood through the lens of military history, regional geopolitics and the long-standing ‘Kashmir question’. This article looks instead to the construction of social and political meaning around the conflict through an examination of the war’s mediatisation in Pakistan. An analysis of different media forms—including radio broadcasts, news dailies, press photography and popular poetry—reveals how a war imaginary was shaped by both domestic crises and global ideological dissension, extending beyond the notion of a timeless Indo-Pak enmity. Taking place at a pivotal moment in the global Cold War, public narratives were built upon not only state agendas but also popular concerns regarding militarism, sovereignty and the politics of aid. These framings ultimately illustrate the deeper entanglements that exist between war, media and mass publics—extending beyond the goals of wartime propaganda alone to produce new national imaginaries and collective subjectivities.Keywords: Cold WarIndiaKashmirmass publicsmedianationalismPakistanphotographypolitics of aidpropagandaradiowar AcknowledgementsThe author would like to thank Gyan Prakash and Jeremy Adelman for comments on an early draft of this piece, as well as two anonymous reviewers for their rich and thoughtful suggestions. She would also like to thank Dawn and The Times of India for permission to reproduce select images, as well as the families of Faiz Ahmed Faiz and Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi for their permission to translate the poems included in this article.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.Notes1. See, for example, the Pakistan Army’s official history, published by the ISPR Directorate: Indo-Pakistan War 1965: A Flashback (Rawalpindi: ISPR Directorate, 1966). While the Indian government’s 1992 official history is more tempered, it has also pushed its own revisionist narrative of victory: Nitin Gokhale, 1965, Turning the Tide: How India Won the War (New Delhi: Centre for Land Warfare Studies, 2015). 2. During the British transfer of power in 1947, the Hindu monarch of Kashmir chose to accede to India in exchange for military assistance against tribal incursions from the Northwest. This led to war with Pakistan, the resolution of which divided the province into Indian and Pakistani territories. United Nations resolutions in 1948 and 1957 called for a plebiscite in Kashmir on the basis of self-determination, which never took place.3. Paul McGarr, The Cold War in South Asia: Britain, The United States and the Indian Subcontinent, 1945–1965 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013): 319.4. The Rann of Kutch is a largely uninhabited salt desert between the Pakistani province of Sind and the Indian state of Gujarat, the boundary of which became a source of territorial dispute soon after independence.5. Particularly in Pakistan, see Gulzar Ahmed, Pakistan Meets Indian Challenge (Rawalpindi: Al Mukhtar Publishers, 1967); Altaf Hasan Qureshi, Jang-e-Sitambar Ki Yaadein (Lahore: Jamhoori Publications, 2018).6. Particularly in India, see Rachna Bisht Rawat, 1965: Stories from the Second Indo-Pak War (New Delhi: Penguin Books, 2015); Dewan Berindranath, The War with Pakistan (New Delhi: Asia Press, 1966). 7. See Sumit Ganguly, The Origins of War in South Asia (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1986); Sumit Ganguly, The Crisis in Kashmir: Portents of War, Hopes of Peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Subrata Mitra, ‘War and Peace in South Asia: A Revisionist View of India-Pakistan Relations’, Contemporary South Asia 10, no. 3 (2001): 361–79.8. Trade continued even during the first India-Pakistan war of 1948—it was not until the wars of 1965 and 1971 that trade became entangled with military concerns and irrevocably disrupted: see Michael Kugelman and Robert Hathaway, ed., Pakistan-India Trade: What Needs to be Done? What Does It Matter? (Washington, DC: The Wilson Center, 2013).9. Cultural interaction included ‘books, newspapers, films, joint mushairas and sports exchanges’: Rashid Ahmad Khan, ‘Friendly Exchanges and People-to-People Contact between Pakistan and India’, Strategic Studies 34, no. 2/3 (2014): 133–46; 136. 10. The 1965 war led to the closing of the Khokhrapar border as well as train services. That year, the international passport system was implemented to regulate travel across the border: see Vazira Fazila-Yacoobali Zamindar, The Long Partition and the Making of Modern South Asia: Refugees, Boundaries, Histories (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007).11. William Mazzarella, ‘A Torn Performative Dispensation: The Affective Politics of British Second World War Propaganda in India and the Problem of Legitimation in an Age of Mass Publics’, South Asian History and Culture 1, no. 1 (2009): 1–24; 12, https://doi.org/10.1080/19472490903387183.12. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, rev. ed., 1991).13. A sampling of this scholarship over the years includes Francesca Orsini, The Hindi Public Sphere, 1920–1940: Language and Literature in the Age of Nationalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002); David Lelyveld, ‘Sir Sayyid’s Public Sphere: Urdu Print and Oratory in Nineteenth Century India’, Cracow Indological Studies 11, no. 11 (2009): 237–67; Rama Sundari Mantena, ‘Vernacular Publics and Political Modernity: Language and Progress in Colonial South India’, Modern Asian Studies 47, no. 5 (2013): 1678–1705; Megan Eaton Robb, Print and the Urdu Public: Muslims, Newspapers, and Urban Life in Colonial India (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021).14. J. Barton Scott and Brannon D. Ingram, ‘What Is a Public? Notes from South Asia’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 38, no. 3 (2015): 357–70; 360, This continues a conversation first initiated by Sandra Freitag’s influential special issue: ‘Aspects of “the Public” in Colonial South Asia’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 14, no. 1 (1991).15. As genealogies of the public have diversified, scholars have increasingly explored the effects of new technologies and medialities: see Aravind Rajagopal, Politics after Television: Hindu Nationalism and the Reshaping of the Public in India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001); William Mazzarella, Censorium: Cinema and the Open Edge of Mass Publicity (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2013); Purnima Mankekar, Screening Culture, Viewing Politics: An Ethnography of Television, Womanhood, and Nation in Postcolonial India (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999).16. Saadia Toor, The State of Islam: Culture and Cold War Politics in Pakistan (London: Pluto Books, 2011); Iftikhar Dadi, Lahore Cinema: Between Realism and Fable (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2022).17. Publishing and press networks (catering to an urban, literate class) were dislocated by the upheavals of Partition; in 1947, there were only four major newspapers published in Pakistan: Pakistan Times, Zamindar, Nawa-e-Waqt and Civil & Military Gazette. Two other important dailies, Dawn (the mouthpiece of the Muslim League) and Jang shifted from Delhi to Karachi in 1947. In the first decade of independence, 103 new dailies were founded.18. Irfan Waheed, ‘Print Culture and Left-Wing Radicalism in Lahore, Pakistan c. 1947–1971’ (unpublished PhD thesis, National University of Singapore, 2016): 206.19. Saima Parveen and Muhammad Nawaz Bhatti, ‘Freedom of Expression and Media Censorship in Pakistan: A Historical Study’, Journal of Historical Studies 4, no. 2 (2018): 1–21; 9.20. Nihal Ahmed, A History of Radio Pakistan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005): 133.21. ‘Broadcasting Body Set Up’, The Pakistan Observer, July 31, 1965: 2.22. Government of Pakistan, Report of the Broadcasting Committee, 1966, Dhaka, Bangladesh: 147. Copy in possession of Asif Munier.23. Abdus Salam Khurshid, ‘Mass Communication Media in Pakistan’, AMIC Travelling Seminar: 1st, Asia, Sep. 5–29, 1971 (Singapore: Asian Mass Communication Research and Information Center, 1971): 12.24. Zamir Niazi, Press in Chains (Karachi: Karachi Press Club, 1986): 117.25. Jan Mieszkowski, Watching War (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012): 36.26. K.S. Mullick, Tangled Tapes: The Inside Story of Indian Broadcasting (Delhi: Sterling Publishers, 1974): 159.27. Amarinder Singh and Tajindar Shergill, Monsoon War: Young Officers Reminisce (Mumbai: Roli Books, 2016): 36.28. Owen Sirrs, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate: Covert Action and Internal Operations (New York: Routledge, 2017): 52.29. ‘Revolutionary Council in Held Kashmir’, Dawn, August 9, 1965: 1. 30. ‘Khufia Radio Station “Sada-e-Kashmir” Ne Apna Kaam Shuru Kar Diya’, Nawa-e-Waqt, August 9, 1965: 1.31. ‘Aqwam Mutahidda ko Tehreek-e-Azadi par Izhaar Tashvish ka Koi Haq Nahi Hai’, Nawa-e-Waqt, August 12, 1965: 1; ‘Allah Is Our Source of Strength’, Dawn, August 12, 1965: 1; ‘India’s Barbarism Won’t End Struggle’, Dawn, August 27, 1965: 11.32. ‘Pakistanis Urged to Join Crusade’, Dawn, August 18, 1965: 1.33. ’It’s Undeclared War’, Dawn, September 4, 1965: 1. 34. Government of India, Radio & Television: Report of the Committee on Broadcasting and Information Media (New Delhi: Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1967): 125. 35. ‘Powerful Broadcast Transmitters Planned in India and Pakistan: A New Source of Friction’, March 1966, CIA Research Reports, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Folder 002711-006-0788.36. Rajesh Krishan Bhat, ‘Strategic Importance of Radio Kashmir in Countering Pakistan’s War of Words against India’, Strategic Analysis 37, no. 2 (2013): 171–77; 174. 37. ‘AIR Broadcasts Yet Another Lie’, Dawn, September 2, 1965: 8; ‘India’s Self-Delusion Won’t Alter Facts’, Dawn, August 14, 1965: 10; ‘Pak Allegations Are Denied’, The Times of India, September 30, 1965: 5.38. Alonso dedicates a chapter to the Radio Pakistan war campaign: Isabel Huacuja Alonso, ‘Radio Pakistan’s Seventeen Days of Drama’, in Radio for the Millions: Hindi-Urdu Broadcasting across Borders (New York: Columbia University Press, 2023): 143–68.39. ‘Bharati Akhbaraat ki Kaghazi Nao’, Imroz, October 25, 1965: 1; ‘Rajasthan mein Pachaas Lakh Afraad Qeht ka Shikaar Ho Jayenge: Times of India’, Nawa-e-Waqt, October 28, 1965: 2; ‘Times of India View: Indian Muslims being Treated as Inferiors’, The Pakistan Observer, August 12, 1965: 2.40. ‘Bharat mein Radio Pakistan Sunnay ki Momanat’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 11, 1965: 1; ‘Mujhe Bharathi Hamle ke Haq mein Khabron ki Tarseel par Majboor Karne ki Koshish Ki Gayi’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 2, 1965: 3.41. Geva writes about the endurance of the Urdu public sphere in post-Partition Delhi, noting that Muslim League papers in Pakistan continued to take an interest in editorial controversies from across the border: Rotem Geva, Delhi Reborn: Partition and Nation Building in India’s Capital (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2022).42. Ibid., 139.43. ’Nation’s Security and Freedom Come First’, Dawn, August 2, 1965: 1. 44. ‘Rann Kutch ka Muahida Ala Tabaddur ka Shahkaar Hai’, Nawa-e-Waqt, July 1, 1965: 1; ‘US Aid Freeze Condemned’, The Pakistan Observer, August 13, 1965: 4.45. See Michael Brecher, ‘Non-Alignment under Stress: The West and the India-China Border War’, Pacific Affairs 52, no. 4 (1979): 612–30.46. Arms and equipment provided by the US in 1962 marked the first time that India had sought large-scale military assistance from a superpower. The news was unanimously condemned in Pakistan’s National Assembly, and mobs of protesters besieged American institutions (such as the USIS library) in multiple West Pakistani cities: McGarr, The Cold War, 160.47. Dawn, July 15, 1965: 1.48. ’Hints of Secret US, India Accord: Likely Basis of Delay in Aid to Pakistan’, Dawn, July 24, 1965: 1; ‘Bharat ke liye Do Gini Amriki Imdaad’, Nawa-e-Waqt, July 22, 1965: 3; ‘Ghalla, Ghalla aur Ghalla?’, Imroz, October 25, 1965: 3.49. ’India and the Atom’, Dawn, September 30, 1965: 8; ‘Shastri se Atom Bomb ka Mutalba’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 24, 1965: 4.50. ‘Pakistan to Play Leading Role in Africa and Asia’, Dawn, August 7, 1965: 10; ‘Pakistan Apni Azadi aur Khud Mukhtari ka Sauda Nahi Karega, Doosri Afro-Asia Conference mein Bharat ko Be-Niqaab Karenge’, Nawa-e-Waqt, July 14, 1965: 1.51. ‘People Urged to Resist Pressure by Imperialists’, Dawn, August 10, 1965: 6.52. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, July 14, 1965, in Awakening the People: A Collection of Articles, Statements and Speeches 1966–1969, ed. Hamid Jalal and Khalid Hasan (Rawalpindi: Pakistan Publications, 1972). 53. ‘Arabs Disillusioned about India’s Friendship’, The Pakistan Observer, September 25, 1965: 9; ‘Bharat ka Ala Kar Bannay ke Baad, Sadha Looh Sikhon ki Zaboon Hali’, Nawa-e-Waqt, August 25, 1965: 5.54. ’Indian Threat to Azad Kashmir: Situation Parallel with Vietnam’, Dawn, August 16, 1965: 1; ‘Kashmir ki Soorat-e-Haal Vietnam aur Malaysia se Ziada Khatarnak Hai’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 1, 1965: 8.55. ‘Khem Karan ke Ilaqai mein Bharati Fauj ke Chorey hue Amriki Aslah ke Box’, September 17, 1965: 1.56. ’1965 War Gallery’, Inter Services Public Relations, accessed June 1, 2022, https://ispr.gov.pk/1965-war-gallery.php.57. ‘Secret Indian Plot to Destroy Bridge’, The Pakistan Observer, October 18, 1965: 1; ‘Pakistan par Zabardast Hamla Karne ke Ek Aur Bharati Mansooba ka Inkishaf’, Nawa-e-Waqt, October 18, 1965: 1.58. For a discussion of allegory as a form of photographic signification, see Zahid R. Chaudhary, Afterimage of Empire: Photography in Nineteenth-Century India (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2012).59. ‘Peshawar ke Kareeb Shehri Abadiyon par Bharati Bombari, Tasveer mein Ek Larka Apne Bache Kuch Samaan Par Betha Hai’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 18, 1965: 1; ‘Sargodha ke Kareeb Bharathi Bombari se Tabah Hone Wale Mukamaat Is Bombari Se Bees Shehri Shaheed Hue’, Nawa-e-Waqt, September 19, 1965: 2; ‘A View of the Senseless Destruction Caused by Indian Air Force Planes which Bombed Civilian Population in Rawalpindi’, Dawn, September 8, 1965: 12.60. The newspaper as a key symbolic form for geopolitical projections of space has been explored by Edmond: Jacob Edmond, ‘Scripted Spaces: The Geopolitics of the Newspaper from Tretiakov to Prigov’, Slavic Review 75, no. 2 (2016): 299–330. 61. Mazzarella, ‘Torn Performative Dispensation’, 14.62. Ibid., 12.63. East Pakistan was left largely undefended during the days of combat; this is often cited as an additional source of resentment in the lead-up to the 1971 war: Ayesha Jalal, The State of Martial Rule (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990): 85.64. ‘Civils of Narayanganj are Preparing Themselves for Defense of the Motherland’, The Pakistan Observer, October 4, 1965: 3.65. Alonso’s chapter on 1965 includes a nuanced discussion of popular war songs, and the famous collaboration between Radio Pakistan and beloved singer and actress, Noor Jehan, who performed and recorded 12 songs back-to-back during the 17 days of war.66. Aijaz Ahmed, ‘In the Mirror of Urdu: Recompositions of Nation and Community, 1947–65’, in Lineages of the Present (New Delhi: Tulika, 1996): 219.67. The Rawalpindi Conspiracy Case was a plot against the government of Liaquat Ali Khan, which was discovered in 1951, in which several Left-wing politicians and intellectuals, including Faiz Ahmed Faiz, were implicated.68. Alamgir Hashmi, ‘Some Directions of Contemporary Urdu Poetry in Pakistan: From 1965 to the Present’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 1, no. 2 (1978): 67–79. 69. C.M. Naim, ‘The Consequences of Indo-Pakistani War for Urdu Language and Literature: A Parting of the Ways?’, The Journal of Asian Studies 28, no. 2 (1969): 269–83; 272.70. Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi, ‘6 September’, Naqsh, Jang Nambar (Karachi: 1966): 396, translation by author. 71. Ibid.72. Saiyid Faizi, ‘Satrah Din, Satrah Saal’, in Razm-o-Nazm (Rawalpindi: Pakistan Council, 1966): 33, reprinted in Faqir Hussain Shakir, Some Development in Urdu Poetry since 1936 (Unpublished Master’s thesis, Durham University, 1969): 223, translation by Faqir Hussain Shakir.73. Akram Tahir, ‘Qaum Bedaar’, Imroz, October 3, 1965: 2, translation by author.74. Ahmad Faraz, ‘Parcham Jaan’, in Shab-e Khun: Jang-i-Sitambar 65 se Mutalliq (Rawalpindi: Yusuf Publishers, 1979): 23, translation by author. 75. Ibid.76. Anjum Romani, ‘Ganjang India’, Imroz, October 2, 1965: 2, translation by author.77. Ibid.78. Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi, ‘Kashmir’, September 1965, reprinted in Muheet (Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publications, 2012): 73, translation by author.79. Ibid.80. Rauf Parekh, ‘Literary Notes: The 1965 War and Pakistani Urdu Literature’, Dawn, September 7, 2015, accessed June 1, 2022, https://www.dawn.com/news/1205330.81. Naim, ‘Consequences’, 275.82. Michael Edwardes, ‘Tashkent and After’, International Affairs 42, no. 3 (1966): 383; ‘Demonstrations by Students’, The Pakistan Times, January 15, 1966: 8.83. ‘Pakistan Stands by Demand for Self-Determination, President Ayub’s Broadcast’, Dawn, January 15, 1966: 1; ‘Ordeal Not Yet Over: Ayub’s Call for Discipline’, The Pakistan Times, January 15, 1966: 1.84. Michael Warner, Publics and Counterpublics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005): 179.85. Faiz Ahmed Faiz, ‘Blackout’ (September 1966), in Nuksha ha-e Wafa (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Karavan, 2014): 409, translation by author.