Not so long ago, it was the invisible "foreign hand" (read the CIA) that was blamed for many of India's ills -- secessionist movements, religious riots, even famines and floods. Now, some Indian politicians have found a new and visible target: foreign cable networks.

The Cable News Network and British Broadcasting Corporation, with their uninhibited coverage of religious conflicts, are adding to the unrest that is spreading across India, according to some cabinet ministers and police officials who are demanding that the cable networks be disciplined.

India's own TV network, Doordarshan, is owned and controlled by the government, and is notorious for sanitizing -- and delaying -- news broadcasts. It waited several hours before announcing the assassination of Indira Gandhi, in October 1984, and of her son Rajiv Gandhi, in May 1991, for example. In covering religious riots, Doordarshan seldom mentions the names of the groups involved, and it has often refused to air award-winning documentaries by Indian filmmakers that are critical of the government.

So it is no surprise that the CNN and BBC, with their aggressive coverage, are roiling the waters. After December 6 -- the day Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, in northeastern India, was demolished by Hindu fundamentalists, leading to nationwide violence in which 1,800 were killed -- Indian political leaders of both the right and the left demanded strong action against the two networks. They contend that there would have been no mass hysteria and violence if CNN had not shown the demolition of the mosque and the BBC had not given a blow-by-blow account of the demolition.

CNN and BBC began airing in India about two years ago. About 30 million people watch BBC and 2 million watch CNN as against Doordarshan's estimated audience of 300 million. "And yet during a national crisis more people flock to BBC and CNN than Doordarshan," says a top bureaucrat who asked for anonymity. "The government is certainly ruing the day it allowed cable network into the country."

Action against the cable networks could come in the form of restrictions on coverage or an outright ban. (The BBC was shut down at least twice during the 1970s.)

"CNN and BBC are routinely blamed by assorted parties," says Nikhil Lakshman, editor of The Sunday Observer, which is published in Bombay and New Delhi. "But when things go in their favor, they hail them."

For example, right-wing Bharatiya Janata party leaders, whose followers destroyed the Babri Mosque, bitterly criticized the cable networks in December. but a month later, when the government used the Army and police to break up a BJP rally, party leaders eagerly made themselves available to CNN and BBC for interviews.

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