Journalism is all about finding facts and then sharing these facts in the form of information with the audience. Unfortunately, in Pakistan, some media groups and political parties are involved in spreading propaganda and yellow news to get the public’s opinion in their own favor. We need to work on thorough fact checking before breaking any news. Unverified facts, research, and information don’t just cause misunderstanding, but it could damage and even potentially change the course of history.

We are well aware that Pakistani news channels have the urge to broadcast news before even confirming it from authenticated sources. Everyone wants to be the first to break the news. This rivalry has caused panic among people time and again. Remember in 2017, when TV channels started airing news about a bomb blast in Gulberg, Lahore? People were terrified by it. Later on, it turned out that the news was false. Followed by this misconduct, Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) issued “show cause notices” to those TV channels that aired the news about the blast without verifying. It also added an online complaint section to its website letting public lodge complaints regarding false media content.

Apart from print and electronic media, social media has started playing a vital role in providing highlights of the daily issues happening not just in the country but throughout the world. It now plays a significant role in disseminating and creaking fake news for increasing their channel ratings. Celebrity controversies are among the most circulated forged news which cause pain to their family and damage their goodwill.

Creating an online complaint section is not enough. It’s time that the government of Pakistani pays serious attention to this issue in hand that’s vastly growing. The problem is, the general public is being used by different parties to believe what they think is right. There are no such laws regarding this misconduct, nobody is aware of them. It would be fair to start a Petition to ask the government of Pakistan for a solution to this problem. Anyone spreading propaganda or publishing yellow news must be penalized and boycotted.

This doesn’t just include journalists but the whole publishing network must be held responsible for publishing yellow news. When Media will be held accountable for their actions, there will be a lot less chaos in Pakistan.