[dropcap color=”#008040″ boxed=”yes” boxed_radius=”8px” class=”” id=””]T[/dropcap]he Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)’s recent declassified documents show that most of the Indian media houses were used by Soviets to plant news. The document titled as “The Soviets in India: Moscow’s Major Penetration Program” says that the Delhi Embassy of erstwhile USSR used to plant fake and manipulative news in Press Trust of India (PTI), Times of India, Hindustan Times, The Hindu, Statesman, Amrit Bazar Patrika, National Herald and Patriot.



This 32 page document was prepared in the late 80s by the CIA. Indian media reported only the first 14 pages which describes how political parties and leaders from Congress, CPM and CPI were funded by the Soviets. The remaining 18 pages were about instances of specific funding to the media houses and cultural and intellectual organisations by the Soviets.



This document which is published at the end of this report shows that Hindustan Times was the major planting area of the Soviets about fake news on America. The document also produced fake news clippings by Times of India and The Hindu.



The CIA report says that the Soviet spy agency KGB planted a fake news in Hindustan Times, that the US Defence Intelligence Agency was funding the Sikh terrorists. Similar fake news was published in Times of India alleging that Pakistan is a CIA Base for recruiting guerrillas. The CIA declassified document says that this report was planted in the Times of India by an Indian employee working in Delhi’s Soviet Information Department (SID).



[dropcap color=”#008040″ boxed=”yes” boxed_radius=”8px” class=”” id=””]T[/dropcap]he document says that The Hindu also did a hit job on the United States by quoting Czechoslovak news agency Cetak and ran a series of stories saying that the CIA had setup centres in Pakistan to train agents for subverting Afghan and Indian governments. The Hindu report’s headline was – ‘More than 100 CIA training centres in Pak’. PTI also ran the same kind of story after The Hindu series. The CIA document says, KGB used Indian media to run anti-US stories and later disseminate to other country newspapers.

The CIA document says that the Indian media houses even stooped down to the level of publishing a report that United States was breeding killer mosquitoes in Pakistan border to attack Indian population!

The CIA document adds that under Soviet’s influence, many Indian newspapers ran stories that CIA was behind Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Hindustan Times even ran a report saying that the overwhelming majority of Supreme Court Advocates belonging to Congress believed the United States had a role in the assassination. Times of India and National Herald also did the same hit job on behalf of the Soviets.

The Soviet Embassy’s units in Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai entertained many journalists including regional newspapers to plant KGB agendas. There were 200 Indians who were staffers in these units of USSR with a 20 million dollar budget allocated for propaganda activities. As many as 40 journalists per year were taken for globetrotting by Soviets to cement the relations.

The CIA document says that the Indian media houses even stooped down to the level of publishing a report that United States was breeding killer mosquitoes in Pakistan border to attack Indian population! It says that the first trick was to publish such fake news in Pro-Left papers such as ‘Blitz’ or ‘Patriot’ or ‘Daily’ in Bombay and the other English newspapers will carry these wrong reports after a few days. After the English newspapers, the regional newspapers will carry forward the fake news planted by Soviets, says the CIA.

The declassified document says that the news agency PTI was totally infiltrated by the Soviets. Somehow, Akashvani and Doordarshan were not, says the CIA document. Soviets also funded publication companies like Sterling, Allied and Pulse and publication section of Patriot. CIA agents in the Soviet Information Division reported that 200,000 dollar per year was given to these publication companies for covert publications.

The full 32 page document published below shows a mirror to Indian media played hard and loose with facts.

CIA Declassified Doc on USSR Penetration in Indian Politics and Media by PGurus on Scribd