South Asia stands out as one of the least integrated regions in the world, lagging far behind Europe and Southeast Asia, both of which have benefited substantially from regional cooperation. The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), originally envisioned as a platform to promote economic collaboration among neighbors, has been functionally defunct for over a decade. Dr. Muhammad Yunus, chief advisor of Bangladesh, has called for reviving SAARC, recognizing its potential for promoting shared prosperity through interdependence. Yet, the unchecked spread and weaponization of misinformation and disinformation across the region jeopardizes this promise.
In the aftermath of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s ouster in August 2024, social media accounts from India amplified sporadic incidents of violence against Hindus to bolster false claims of an ongoing “Hindu genocide” in the country. Earlier this year, social media platforms and mainstream media outlets in both India and Pakistan were flooded with misinformation during renewed armed conflict, shaping public opinion in real time. Similarly, in 2022 and 2023, online misinformation significantly strained Maldives–India relations, driving the opposition’s “India Out” campaign ahead of the presidential election.
Across South Asia, misinformation and disinformation are actively redefining relations between countries, creating distrust and ill-informed discourse that pose significant structural obstacles to the regional unity that SAARC was originally designed to promote.
The Social Media Spiral
With growing internet access, social media has become the primary vector for the misinformation crisis in South Asia. During the India-Pakistan conflict in May, triggered by the killing of Indian tourists and a local in Kashmir, platforms like X (formerly Twitter) were flooded with out-of-context footage and doctored visuals. One AI-generated video, purporting to show a senior Pakistani general admitting the loss of two aircraft, garnered over 750,000 views on X and was even cited by major Indian outlets like NDTV and Firstpost to reinforce nationalist narratives of superiority over Pakistan.
A similar pattern unfolded after Sheikh Hasina’s ouster. Both Muslims and Hindus fell victim to the political violence in Bangladesh, albeit with some religiously motivated instances. However, a network of X accounts, 70% of which were Indian, spread false claims of targeted communal violence. Among other common mischaracterizations, Muslim-owned establishments that came under attack were frequently misrepresented as Hindu-owned. Together, these posts amassed over 154 million views on X.
In the Maldives, X became a battleground for the ‘India Out’ campaign, a movement to reduce Indian influence in the country, which targeted then-President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih’s India-friendly policies. In 2022, a week’s worth of X posts with #Indiaout hashtag had amassed over 7 million impressions—notably, in a country of only 123,000 X users. During the 2023 Presidential election, European Union observers reported disinformation campaigns by the opposition that were designed to stoke fears of outsized Indian influence over the country’s leadership.
Social Media and News Outlets
When social media devolves into a breeding ground for false narratives, political tensions often escalate. Indian and Pakistani officials have regularly accused each other of spreading propaganda, while Bangladeshi leaders have condemned India of exaggerating communal violence for political dividends. In the Maldives, the election of President Mohamed Muizzu on an ‘India Out’ platform intensified diplomatic friction. Tensions escalated when leaders and supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spearheaded online campaigns calling for a boycott of the Maldives while promoting India’s Lakshadweep archipelago as an alternative tourist destination.
Across the region, social media has become a key instrument for promoting enmity between neighbors. The problem worsens when misinformation seamlessly transitions from social media to mainstream newsrooms. Indian and Pakistani television outlets incorporated bold banners, militaristic graphics, and dramatic sound effects to imbue false and misleading claims with undue credibility. The Express Tribune in Pakistan reported that the country’s air force had destroyed India’s multi-billion-dollar air defence system at the Adampur Air Base, while live coverage by Republic TV in India announced major attacks by the Indian Navy on the Port of Karachi. Neither were true.
In Bangladesh, at least 49 Indian news outlets published 13 false reports of communal violence following Hasina’s ouster, with right-wing outlets like Organiser, a Hindu nationalist mouthpiece, generously employing the term “Hindu genocide.” In the Maldives, opposition-aligned outlets such as The Maldives Journal and Maldives News Network ran stories targeting India, accusing Indian diplomats of espionage.
Path to Regional Recovery and Unity
This constant flow of misinformation from social media to mainstream media represents the gravest threat to regional cohesion: a deeply flawed informational ecosystem where fact routinely loses to viral fiction. Jingoistic, irresponsible journalism from news outlets coupled with near-absent content moderation by social media platforms engenders animosity, leaving South Asia more divided.
As SAARC’s largest and most influential members, India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan possess the political leverage needed to revive cooperative frameworks. However, dismantling the structural barriers posed by misinformation is not a simple act. It demands a multi-pronged approach with the participation of diverse stakeholders across the region.
A crucial first step would be for journalists to establish stronger standards for ethics and accuracy, and for media outlets to invest in cross-border partnerships that can produce more objective reporting. Boom Fact Check and WebQoof by the Quint, outlets whose operations have been certified by the International Fact Checking Network, provide compelling models for integrating fact checking into the modern news landscape. Robust transnational journalistic cooperation can prevent misinformation from seeping into mainstream discourse.
At the governmental level, regional authorities must partner with fact-checking organizations to track and respond to disinformation campaigns across linguistic and national lines, particularly those at risk of inciting hate and hostility between religious, ethnic, or national groups. Hand in hand, media regulators must enforce stronger accountability measures for both digital platforms and mainstream news outlets. Social media platforms must be held to stricter transparency and moderation standards in regional languages.
While such reforms would likely face political and institutional resistance, the successes of regional integration in Europe and Southeast Asia offer a clear lesson that combating misinformation and disinformation is fundamental to building a more peaceful, cooperative, and united South Asia.