KARACHI, Nov 6: Blocked by the government and facing harsh curbs, private television channels in Pakistan have turned to the Internet to reach viewers starved of news about the state of emergency in the country.

Authorities took cable broadcasters off the air on Saturday evening when they first started to report that President General Pervez Musharraf was about to impose a state of emergency, which he did minutes later.

Since then, most Pakistanis have faced either blank screens or the sanitized news broadcast by the state television — a black hole that helped fuel rumours on Monday that Musharraf had himself been ousted by the army.

But the independent stations have hit back with Internet streaming and satellite broadcasting.

“News is a contraband item in Pakistan now and it is being sold on the black market,” Imran Aslam, the president of Geo, told AFP.

Geo sent an SMS to cellphone users on Sunday telling them to log onto its website — www.geo.tv — to get live transmission. Another news channel, ARY One, sent out a similar mail giving its address — www.arydigital.tv.

“Technology has progressed beyond (the government’s) imagination and we believe this is the best time to put new media into operation,” said Aslam, whose channel is running an on-screen counter showing the time elapsed since the emergency began.

He added that there had been a “rush on Internet log-ons” since Musharraf imposed emergency rule.

There are between three and five million Internet users among Pakistan’s 160 million-strong population, service providers say, up from less than one million in 2001.

It is a bitter irony for both Musharraf and the private channels that it is he who was responsible for the revolution in Pakistan’s once staid electronic media.

Musharraf liberalised television regulations in 2003 heralding an explosive growth of channels that now beam talk shows, satirical political skits and soaps to millions of Pakistanis. But he resented their critical stance after he sacked the chief justice of Pakistan on March 9 this year. Geo’s Islamabad bureau was smashed up by police on March 16, although Musharraf called them live on air to apologize.

So it was little surprise when Musharraf issued strict edicts to the print and electronic media on Saturday in the wake of his emergency rule declaration. It bans anything that defames or ridicules him, state officials or the army, and threatens violators with up to three years in jail or a fine of Rs10 million. Broadcasters can have their equipment confiscated and their premises shut.

“Professional journalists find ways to tell people the truth,” said Azhar Abbas, director of news and current affairs at DawnNews, Pakistan’s first English-language news channel.

“We are already live screening on our website… we are trying to establish other ways of keeping Pakistan in the picture,” he added.

The channels can also be accessed via satellite. “Sales of satellite dishes have jumped since the weekend,” traders said.

“I used to sell one or two dishes in a week, but today alone I received orders for 30 dishes,” said Mohammad Hadi, who sells satellite equipment in Multan.

Meanwhile, the blackout has also given a boost to Pakistan’s “old” media — the print media — and newspaper hawkers in Karachi said their sales had doubled since the proclamation of emergency.

“Dozens of people are coming to my stall on the way to work to see the newspaper headlines. It is like the old days before the television channels came,” said a newsstand owner, Shahid Mehmood.

The ban on the electronic media has particularly perturbed women who are less likely to go outside and so rely on the TV channels for information.

“We are really in the dark now. There is nothing on except soaps and movies,” said a Karachi resident, Hameeda Khan.

DawnNews channel’s Abbas said that rumours circulating in the information vacuum would only heighten the uncertainty in Pakistan.

“The government should lift the ban and let the people know the truth,” he said.—AFP