Media coverage of Maldives parliamentary elections and its implications for India

India and Maldives share ethnic, linguistic, cultural, religious, and commercial links steeped in antiquity and established diplomatic relations. Maldives has shown its commitment to maintain close relations with India under “India first” policy (The Wire, https://thewire.in/). However, immediately after his election, Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu took a pro-China shift for the Indian Ocean archipelago, from traditional partner India on trade policy (Junayd, 2023). Muizzu relaunched the “India Out” campaign and won the presidential elections in 2023 (Gupta, 2024). As soon as he came to power, the relations between India and Maldives soured when he ordered India to withdraw military personnel from the island nation (Scroll, 2024). The relationship between the two countries worsened in January 2024 after controversial remarks of three Maldives officials targeting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's attempt to promote Lakshadweep as a tourist destination. (Chitre, 2024). The location of Maldives has been strategic as well as vital for India's defence. After the Chinese possession of Sri Lanka's Hambantota Port, the Maldives remains the only single key strategic point guarding the south-western mainland of India against any sort of maritime threat (Lal, 2024). The outcome of the April 2024 parliamentary elections in Maldives has substantial ramifications for Maldivian foreign policy and regional dynamics. Muizzu's People's National Congress (PNC) won majority of the seats. President Muizzu's pro-China stance is expected to undergo scrutiny both locally and abroad, particularly in India. This review will analyze the media coverage of the parliamentary elections to understand the perception of the Indian mainstream media. The authors examined Indian mainstream media platforms such as The Times of India, Hindustan Times, The Economic Times, and NDTV. The authors refer to these media platforms as mainstream media because of two pertinent aspects. As per the Audit Reports of Circulations published in 2023, The Times of India, Hindustan Times, and The Economic Times are highest circulated daily among English newspapers. On the other hand, The Times of India, Hindustan Times, The Economic Times, and NDTV (only deals with digital news publications) have 4.01 million, 7.06 million, 2.59 million, and 13.7 million subscribers on YouTube. Therefore, based on the scale of circulation, penetration among the common people, and number of subscribers on YouTube prompted us to term the above-mentioned media platforms as mainstream media (Table 1). Since the elections were held on April 21, 2024 the authors considered media coverage of April 21 and April 22, 2024 or during and a day after the polls. The authors analyzed total 25 stories published in the mainstream media platforms during this stipulated period. The news articles were further categorized as reports and opinions. The day before voting, the Indian Mainstream media tried to set a narrative that Maldives polls is a test of President Muizzu amid anti-India policies. Certain key words like “stern test on India policy,” “litmus test amid anti-India policy,” “pro-China policy” were noticed. For instance, it was reported that Maldives elections is a litmus test for President Muizzu's anti-India policies (Gupta, 2024; NDTV, 2024a; 2024b). The Economic Times (2024a) report titled “Maldives votes in the shadow of India-China rivalry” touched upon Muizzu's tilt towards China's and nothing else. However, The Economic Times (2024b) and Parashar (2024) discussed President Muizzu has been spreading hate and lies in Maldives to win Maldives polls (Hyperlink/reference these 2 stories to show proof) (Table 2). Once the elections were over, the reporting pattern was almost similar among all the media platforms when they referred to parliamentary election results as a “landslide win for pro-China leader,” “a pro-Beijing voting,” and “victory for pro-China president” (Hindustan Times, 2024a; Hindustan Times, 2024b; Laskar, 2024a; NDTV, 2024c). The Times of India (2024a) alleged that the victory signals more power to Muizzu while other media platforms claimed that landslide victory of Muizzu's party reflected public support for his moves toward a closer security and economic cooperation with China and reduce his country's dependence on New Delhi. The Times of India (2024b) claimed that China is the winner in the Maldives election because PNC's victory allows President Muizzu to move forward with infrastructure projects funded by China thus potentially increasing Maldives dependence on Chinese loans and integration into Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative. Hindustan Times (2024b) narrated that Maldives voted pro-Beijing and it ratified the Muizzu's pro-China policies. The Economic Times, NDTV, and Hindustan Times reported on common theme that China congratulated President Muizzu on securing absolute majority in parliamentary elections and expressed its willingness to deepen the comprehensive strategic partnership between two countries (Hindustan Times, 2024c; NDTV, 2024d; The Economic Times, 2024c). The Indian mainstream media claimed that President Muizzu's policies were anti-India or pro-China on several grounds like expulsion of Indian troops from Maldives and awarding high-profile infrastructure contracts to Chinese state-owned companies. (Gupta, 2024). It is also important to note that since he became president in October last year, Muizzu signed 20 pacts with China along with “comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership” in January 2024 (Hindustan Times, 2024c). China also promised to send more tourists to Maldives (The Economic Times, 2024c). While analyzing the implications of Maldives parliamentary for India, two broad themes emerged in Indian media. First, what Maldives polls mean for India, and second, Maldives parliamentary elections are matter of concern and setback for India. Laskar (2024b) opined that election results in Malé raise concerns in New Delhi, as Muizzu's policies have reduced the Maldives' reliance on Indian crucial sectors such as food and energy security, and security cooperation. The Times of India claimed that the poll victory has allowed Muizzu to press ahead with closer economic and defence cooperation with China, and diverging from traditional ally India (Ghazal, 2024; The Times of India, 2024c). The Economic Times (2024d) called the outcome of the parliamentary elections as having an impact on India's security interests in the region. The former Indian ambassador to Myanmar Rajiv Bhatia opined that the outcome of the Maldives poll is a setback to India's neighborhood diplomacy (NDTV, 2024e). He foresaw the rise of political forces that are favouring China. The actual outcome of polls in the Maldives would only add to the growing concerns within the Indian establishment regarding the situation in the Indian Ocean archipelago and the India-Maldives future relations (Laskar., 2024c; The Economic Times, 2024e). The mainstream media highlighted the possible repercussions on India-Maldives relationship. The tone and choice of words in the Indian mainstream media was sort of negative and anti-India. The Indian mainstream media's coverage of the 2024 Maldives Parliamentary Elections reflected a sense of concern and uncertainty regarding the future of India−Maldives relations. The reporting emphasized the strategic importance of the Maldives to India and the potential challenges posed by the election results. The media narrative largely framed the situation as a setback for Indian interests in the region, with a particular focus on the growing Chinese influence. The Indian mainstream media was vocal about the increasing dependence of Maldives on China in terms of finance, defence, and infrastructural support as well as broader geopolitical developments in the Indo-Pacific region. WEB RESOURCES Hindustan Times: https://www.hindustantimes.com/ NDTV: https://www.ndtv.com/ Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/ Scroll: https://scroll.in/ The Economic Times: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ The Times of India: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ The Wire: https://thewire.in/