How Indian media reported on “Sri Lankan Economic Crisis”

Abstract

is facing one of greatest economic crises since its independence in 1948, affecting its more than 22 million people (Cogan & Ahlawat, 2022). Food items, medicine and fuel ran out of stock or became unaffordable (Subramanian, 2022). People are dying while waiting in lines for petrol. School exams are being cancelled due to a lack of funds to import paper and ink (Vanamali, 2022). With Sri Lanka facing an unprecedented economic crisis, an influx of refugees to Tamil Nadu has begun (Janardhanan, 2022). Amid increasing protests, opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe was sworn as Sri Lanka's Prime Minister, after Mahinda Rajapaksa resigned following violent protests over the worst economic crisis (The Times of India, 2022). Wickremesinghe announced the government will have to print money in order pay salaries (Perera, 2022).Sri Lanka has sided with China in the past few years. China is the biggest bilateral lender and owns at least 10% of Sri Lanka's $51 billion external debt (New18, 2022). Experts opined that China has contributed to the current devastating economic crisis in Sri Lanka by large scale investments and debt-trap diplomacy (Business Standard, 2022a). Many of these projects, like the Rajapaksa airport, Hambantota port, a conference hall, the Colombo Lotus Tower are funded by China, and stand as reminders of mismanagement of funds (Nath, 2022).Meanwhile, India, which follows "neighborhood first policy," is trying to bring Sri Lanka out of the current crisis. India, which made its commitment to grant loans, credit lines and currency swaps (The Times of India, 2022b) and emerged as the biggest providers of aid to Sri Lanka, seeks to win public trust in crisis hit Sri Lanka (Srivastava, 2022). Since January 2022, India has extended almost $3 billion to Sri Lanka (Kuruwita, 2022). Sri Lankan Prime Minister praised India for extending support to strengthen the ties between the two nations (Business Standard, 2022b). In this study, we will analyze how the Indian mainstream media reported the Sri Lankan economic crisis and its implications on India. We analyzed Indian mainstream media such as The Print, The Wire, The Indian Express, The Times of India, and The Hindu to elaborate our findings. The authors considered media coverage from 25th March 2022 to 31st May 2022.The Indian mainstream media generally portrayed Sri Lankan economic crisis as "Chinese debt-trap" rather than a consequence of decades of misgovernance and poor economic choices. It is reported that the crisis is caused in part by a lack of foreign