ABSTRACT
Dicourses produced in the print media generally carry implicit ideologies to shape the cognitive make up of its readership. English newspapers in Pakistan and India also use such discourse strategies to adance their own countries’ ideological agenda. This research study, therefore, aimed to explore the discursive strategies that two leading English dailies of the two countries employed to portray ideological conflict in relation to the Indian-claimed surgical strikes (2016) against terrorist hideouts in Pakistani territory. To achieve this aim, editorials from English newspapers of both the countries were purposively selected and analyzed using Ideological Square Model proposed by van Dijk (1996,1998). The results of the study show that discourses of the newspaper editorials of both the countries carry discursive strategies that display the ideological conflict of the two countries in relation to terrorism. Using strategies such as passivisation, positive self-presentation, negative otherpresentation, passivisation, personalization, and metonymy, the Indian editorial considers these strikes valid and successful, while Pakistani editorial vehemently denies this, thereby accentuating the Us and Them dicotomy. The findings of the study has implications for general readership as well as political elite of the two countries.
