BBC tax raids put India’s press freedom in highlight

By AFP

NEW DELHI: Just weeks after the BBC aired a documentary inspecting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s position in lethal 2002 sectarian riots, tax inspectors descended on the broadcaster’s workplaces.

Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party says the 2 should not linked, however rights teams say the BBC raids this week present the parlous state of press freedom on this planet’s largest democracy.

News retailers that publish unfavourable reporting discover themselves focused with authorized motion, whereas journalists important of the federal government are harassed and even imprisoned.

The three-day lockdown of the BBC’s workplaces in New Delhi and Mumbai is the newest of a number of related “search and survey” operations in opposition to media homes.

“Unfortunately, this is becoming a trend, there is no shying away from that,” Kunal Majumdar of the Committee to Protect Journalists informed AFP.

At least 4 Indian retailers that had critically reported on the federal government have been raided by tax officers or monetary crimes investigators previously two years, he stated. As with the BBC, these retailers stated officers confiscated telephones and accessed computer systems utilized by journalists.

“When you have authorities trying to go through your material, go through your work, that’s intimidation,” Majumdar added. “The international community ought to wake up and start taking this matter seriously.”

India has fallen 10 spots to one hundred and fiftieth on the World Press Freedom Index, compiled by Reporters Without Borders, since Modi took workplace in 2014.

Journalists have lengthy confronted harassment, authorized threats and intimidation for his or her work in India however extra legal circumstances are being lodged in opposition to reporters than ever, based on the Free Speech Collective.

Criminal complaints have been issued in opposition to a report 67 journalists in 2020, the newest yr for which figures can be found, the native civil society group reported.

Ten journalists have been behind bars in India in the beginning of the yr, based on Reporters Without Borders.

Once arrested, reporters can spend months and even years ready for the circumstances in opposition to them to proceed by way of the courts.

‘Why be afraid?’
The BBC documentary explored Modi’s time as chief minister of Gujarat state throughout spiritual riots that killed a minimum of 1,000 individuals, most of them minority Muslims.

The programme cited a British overseas ministry report claiming that Modi met senior cops and “ordered them not to intervene” in anti-Muslim violence by right-wing Hindu teams.

The two-part sequence featured a BBC interview with Modi shortly after the riots, wherein he was requested whether or not he may have dealt with the matter otherwise.

Modi responded that his fundamental weak spot was not realizing “how to handle the media”.

“That’s been something he has been taking care of since,” Hartosh Singh Bal, the political editor of India’s Caravan journal, informed AFP.

“That sums up his attitude.”

The BBC documentary didn’t air in India however provoked a livid response from the federal government, which dismissed its contents as “hostile propaganda”.

Authorities used data know-how legal guidelines to ban the sharing of hyperlinks to the programme in an effort to cease its unfold on social media.

Gaurav Bhatia, a BJP spokesman, stated this week’s raids on the BBC workplaces have been lawful and the timing had nothing to do with the documentary’s broadcast.

“If you have been following the law of the country, if you have nothing to hide, why be afraid of an action that is according to the law,” he informed reporters.

‘Misogynistic and sectarian assaults’
Unfavourable reporting in India can immediate not solely authorized threats from the federal government, however a daunting backlash from members of the general public.

“Indian journalists who are too critical of the government are subjected to all-out harassment and attack campaigns by Modi devotees,” Reporters Without Borders stated final yr.

Washington Post columnist Rana Ayyub has been a persistent goal of Modi supporters since conducting an undercover investigation that alleged authorities officers have been implicated within the 2002 Gujarat riots.

She has been subjected to a web-based disinformation barrage, together with doctored tweets suggesting she had defended baby rapists and a report falsely asserting her arrest for cash laundering.

UN-appointed consultants singled out her case final yr and stated she had endured “relentless misogynistic and sectarian attacks”.

They additionally stated Ayyub had been focused by Indian authorities with varied types of harassment, together with the freezing of her financial institution accounts over tax fraud and cash laundering allegations.

“I am witnessing a depravity daily that I had not witnessed before,” Ayyub informed AFP.

Burnt copies of a e book she authored had been despatched to her dwelling in Mumbai and somebody threatened to gang-rape her in entrance of her household, she stated.

“They are emboldened,” she added, “knowing that nobody will take action against them.”

NEW DELHI: Just weeks after the BBC aired a documentary inspecting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s position in lethal 2002 sectarian riots, tax inspectors descended on the broadcaster’s workplaces.

Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party says the 2 should not linked, however rights teams say the BBC raids this week present the parlous state of press freedom on this planet’s largest democracy.

News retailers that publish unfavourable reporting discover themselves focused with authorized motion, whereas journalists important of the federal government are harassed and even imprisoned.

The three-day lockdown of the BBC’s workplaces in New Delhi and Mumbai is the newest of a number of related “search and survey” operations in opposition to media homes.

“Unfortunately, this is becoming a trend, there is no shying away from that,” Kunal Majumdar of the Committee to Protect Journalists informed AFP.

At least 4 Indian retailers that had critically reported on the federal government have been raided by tax officers or monetary crimes investigators previously two years, he stated. As with the BBC, these retailers stated officers confiscated telephones and accessed computer systems utilized by journalists.

“When you have authorities trying to go through your material, go through your work, that’s intimidation,” Majumdar added. “The international community ought to wake up and start taking this matter seriously.”

India has fallen 10 spots to one hundred and fiftieth on the World Press Freedom Index, compiled by Reporters Without Borders, since Modi took workplace in 2014.

Journalists have lengthy confronted harassment, authorized threats and intimidation for his or her work in India however extra legal circumstances are being lodged in opposition to reporters than ever, based on the Free Speech Collective.

Criminal complaints have been issued in opposition to a report 67 journalists in 2020, the newest yr for which figures can be found, the native civil society group reported.

Ten journalists have been behind bars in India in the beginning of the yr, based on Reporters Without Borders.

Once arrested, reporters can spend months and even years ready for the circumstances in opposition to them to proceed by way of the courts.

‘Why be afraid?’
The BBC documentary explored Modi’s time as chief minister of Gujarat state throughout spiritual riots that killed a minimum of 1,000 individuals, most of them minority Muslims.

The programme cited a British overseas ministry report claiming that Modi met senior cops and “ordered them not to intervene” in anti-Muslim violence by right-wing Hindu teams.

The two-part sequence featured a BBC interview with Modi shortly after the riots, wherein he was requested whether or not he may have dealt with the matter otherwise.

Modi responded that his fundamental weak spot was not realizing “how to handle the media”.

“That’s been something he has been taking care of since,” Hartosh Singh Bal, the political editor of India’s Caravan journal, informed AFP.

“That sums up his attitude.”

The BBC documentary didn’t air in India however provoked a livid response from the federal government, which dismissed its contents as “hostile propaganda”.

Authorities used data know-how legal guidelines to ban the sharing of hyperlinks to the programme in an effort to cease its unfold on social media.

Gaurav Bhatia, a BJP spokesman, stated this week’s raids on the BBC workplaces have been lawful and the timing had nothing to do with the documentary’s broadcast.

“If you have been following the law of the country, if you have nothing to hide, why be afraid of an action that is according to the law,” he informed reporters.

‘Misogynistic and sectarian assaults’
Unfavourable reporting in India can immediate not solely authorized threats from the federal government, however a daunting backlash from members of the general public.

“Indian journalists who are too critical of the government are subjected to all-out harassment and attack campaigns by Modi devotees,” Reporters Without Borders stated final yr.

Washington Post columnist Rana Ayyub has been a persistent goal of Modi supporters since conducting an undercover investigation that alleged authorities officers have been implicated within the 2002 Gujarat riots.

She has been subjected to a web-based disinformation barrage, together with doctored tweets suggesting she had defended baby rapists and a report falsely asserting her arrest for cash laundering.

UN-appointed consultants singled out her case final yr and stated she had endured “relentless misogynistic and sectarian attacks”.

They additionally stated Ayyub had been focused by Indian authorities with varied types of harassment, together with the freezing of her financial institution accounts over tax fraud and cash laundering allegations.

“I am witnessing a depravity daily that I had not witnessed before,” Ayyub informed AFP.

Burnt copies of a e book she authored had been despatched to her dwelling in Mumbai and somebody threatened to gang-rape her in entrance of her household, she stated.

“They are emboldened,” she added, “knowing that nobody will take action against them.”