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Scholars plead for rumour control mechanism

Concerned over the way the salt rumour sent people into panic-buying across northern and eastern India, social scientists have urged the government to chalk out an effective national policy regarding a rumour control mechanism.

Rumours, described by William Shakespeare as monster with uncounted heads, could lead to civil disorder and demoralisation, especially in a country like India which was vulnerable to misinformation campaigns and psychological warfare, pointed out scholars of the Benaras Hindu University.

Prof Ramesh Chandra Misra of the BHU psychology department said rumours are a product of a situation of ambiguity regarding important objects and events. A rumour might be benign or fatal, and it was for the government to intervene and clear the ambiguity as soon as possible.

Since salt is any important item of consumption and when there is an atmosphere of uncertainty about availability of general food items, rumours regarding its scarcity could easily be generated, he said, adding that it was distressing that despite a wide information network, the government and the society failed in checking the rumour on time.

A study by psychologist, the late Prof Durganand Sinha noted that milk drinking Ganesh was perhaps the biggest social participation in a rumour-generated action. However, it ended in just one day and the whole exercise was quite benign, he said.

Dr Kaushal Kishore Misra, political scientist in the BHU, said that in the current international situation when India holds specific views on issues like nuclear policy, world economic order and human rights, the country could be soft target of rumours, disinformation and other kind of psychological warfare launched by a hostile world power.

Dr Jagdish Narain Singh, a sociologist, said the national advisory commission of the United States had found that rumours significantly aggravated tension and disorder in more than 65 per cent of the cases studied by it. The commission felt that the harmful effect of rumours could be offset if police, public servants and community leaders quickly and effectively circulated the facts.

He said psychologists in the US had taken the initiative to study and combat rumours as early as in 1946 when Prof Gordon Allport of Harvard University had opened a rumour clinic. The concept of the rumour clinic was adopted by the US government and since 1960s, the government established rumour control centres all over the country, he said

In Varanasi city, a police network had been created in 1993 at the time of communal disturbances and under this the main city area was connected to the police control room located at Gyanvapi mosque-Vishwanath temple complex. As per the arrangement, the verified information was to be disseminated by the control rooms through the amplifier network to the various parts of the city. However, surprisingly, the network was yet to be used as the loud speakers remained silent during the Ganesh milk drinking episode, dropsy panic and the salt rumours.

UNI

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