New Delhi, February 14:

Senior cabinet ministers today voiced concern over the media reporting of the Mumbai violence which some of them felt sparked panic and led to a mass exodus from the metropolitan city to Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.

The ministers expressed their outrage at a cabinet meeting presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a day after Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray was arrested on charges of inciting ethnic hatred and then bailed out.

Cabinet sources said that once Railway Minister Lalu Prasad raised the issue, some ministers described as “irresponsible” and “provocative” the media coverage of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena protests that began on February 3.

Home Minister Shivraj Patil pointed out that television news channels had been beaming pictures of sporadic trouble frequently giving a “false impression about the violence and thereby creating panic”.

A cabinet minister said: “For once, every minister was furious and everyone agreed that the media coverage caused more trouble.”

Thackeray’s supporters attacked north Indians — a euphemism for migrants from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh — calling them “outsiders”.

One minister felt that it was the media that made Thackeray, “a person who tried to strengthen his party by dividing the country,” into a hero.

“The media should not forget its social responsibilities when it reports such events. It is high time that there should be some control over such reporting,” a minister told reporters on condition of anonymity.