Who is lying - Zardari or the Indian Media?

For the past few weeks, Indian media has reported that Indian agencies are saying there is undeniable proof that the masterminds of the 26/11 terror attack have links to Pakistan. Yet one man, the President of Pakistan, Mr Asif Ali Zardari has been consistently denying these allegations. In fact, today there's an article on the NDTV website which says Mr. Zardari even denies that there is any evidence that Qasab, the lone terrorist captured alive from the Shivaji Terminus attack site, has anything to do with Pakistan. This after media reports on how Qasab's parents have been identified and the the whole family resides in Faridkot in the Punjab province of Pakistan. Well, they resided there till they mysteriously (and so predictably, what can you expect?) disappeared on December 3rd, 2008 presumably moved to a safe-house by the Pakistani government or worse, are now being held captive by some terrorist outfit. I say this in the naive belief that the two are separate entities. I just hope and pray that they are still alive and safe.

Well, the question foremost on my mind is who is lying? The media is not made of one or a handful of people. Its a much bigger network of journalists, reporters and other people. Could they all be lying? I am wary of nationalistic media propaganda that in the fashion of post 9/11 reports, drums up mass hysteria to lend support to a government that launches an unjustified military attack on another country. I also beleive that the Indian media, from time to time, does display such jingoistic tendencies but now that it has become pretty clear that public consensus in India is clearly against waging a war against Pakistan, what purpose would such propaganda or jingoism serve?

And why should we doubt the veracity of all these news reports when the man who denies them all, Mr Zardari, has been accused of money laundering by the Swiss, British and US goverments and no court has so far been able to give him a clean chit? Not only this, Mr Zardari also allegedly lied about his educational background saying he obtained a B.Ed degree from the London School of Economics and Business which cannot be corroborated. And for the records, I didn't make this story up nor did any member of the Indian media. This report comes from the media establishment in Pakistan.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\03\12\story_12-3-2008_pg7_17