Media hype halts Kalyan Singh to explore the fact before making claim

Amjad Mehmood

Media in Pakistan is under discussion to classify a literal definition of fake news. Veteran journalists, legal experts and political gurus are engaged to explain the axis of fake news according to their best understanding.

There is need to establish a difference between fake and wrong news. If something never happens and being reported is an obvious example of ‘fake’ news but if something is happened and reported factually incorrect may be categorised a ’wrong’ news but not fake. Sometimes, a news becomes unintentionally wrong due to lack of research work and cross verification from the reporter or media outlet but spreading a fake news is purely a professional and moral dishonesty.

A similar wrong news is surfing nowadays on Pakistani print and electronic media that a 42-year-old Sikh, Kalyan Singh Kalyan is the first Pakistani Sikh who has completed his PhD degree in the subject of Punjabi from Punjab University by writing a thesis on “Life & Teachings of Guru Nanak” under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Naveed Shehzad. The scholar indeed made efforts and earned a degree from a reputed university of Pakistan, but he is not the first Pakistani Sikh to achieve this prestigious milestone. He himself being a researcher did not bother to carry out research within his community to learn if there was another Pakistani Sikh before him who has complete PhD degree.

In a sense of pride and glorification of media, he stood with his claim contrary to fact that in 2018 another Pakistani Sikh Dr. Kapil Kanwal originally from Peshawar has complete his PhD degree in Wireless Communication under the supervision of Dr. Ghazanfar Ali Safdar at University of Bedfordshire, United Kingdom. His dissertation was on ‘Energy Management in LTE Networks’. Dr. Kapil Kanwal has passed his BSC (Hons) degree in computer science from Edwards College, Peshawar in 2008. Later, he went to United Kingdom for higher education and completed his master’s degree in computer networks in 2011 from University of Bedfordshire. Currently, he is a successful entrepreneur and residing in Manchester, United Kingdom.