Lahore Press Club President Arshad Ansari’s viral abusive video has sparked a fresh controversy after he refused to recognize digital journalists, exposing a deep divide within Pakistan’s media community.
OPED – Imran Malik
A profanity-laden video and a refusal to recognize digital journalists have put the Lahore Press Club president at the center of a controversy that reveals a deeper fault line running through Pakistan’s media landscape.
A video circulated on social media days ago showing Arshad Ansari, President of the Lahore Press Club, using crude and abusive language. The clip drew swift condemnation from serious circles within the media community, with many reminding Ansari that his position carries the weight of an institution and demands a standard of conduct that his outburst plainly failed to meet.
In response, journalist Hafeezullah Niazi used his channel to address the situation, explaining the context behind the incident and urging Ansari to refrain from using his office and profession as instruments of pressure or blackmail. It briefly appeared that the matter might pass.
It did not.
Since yesterday, Ansari has been doubling down, holding court at Post Cards and directing considerable energy toward discrediting Niazi. His central argument is revealing: he refuses to recognize Hafeezullah Niazi as a journalist or media person at all.
This is Arshad Ansari’s old-school thinking laid bare. He does not consider digital media practitioners to be journalists. It is precisely this mindset, this refusal to accept the legitimacy of digital journalism, that has left print and electronic media figures trailing behind while digital media has surged ahead in reach, relevance and audience trust.
There is a well-understood principle in any dispute: when you are in the wrong, silence is your strongest weapon. Every additional statement invites further scrutiny, and every escalation widens the story.
The question now is whether this controversy, which began with a viral video and has been kept alive by the man at its center, will become a defining issue in the next Lahore Press Club elections.
A disclosure: this column is written by Imran Malik, a digital media professional. He is neither a member of the Lahore Press Club nor has he taken a plot in the journalist colony, simply because he does not consider himself a journalist in the traditional institutional sense.
MediaBites.com.pk
