Disha Ravi got bail after 9 days in police custody, while activist Safoora Zargar 27, from Kishtwar, Jammu, and Kashmir, who was pregnant at the time of her arrest in April 2020, is denied bail and many others like Zargar are still languishing in jail.
Safoora Zargar faces conspiracy charges in connection with her participation in anti-CAA protests and an alleged role of instigating the Delhi riots was booked under the anti-terror Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). Apart from the UAPA, she faces similar IPC charges as Disha Ravi. Like Zarga, many others are still languishing in prison.
In 2020 alone, 67 journalists arrested, detained, questioned in India for their work of journalism, with 73 of the 154 cases against journalists documented in the last 10 years are documented to be from BJP-ruled states!
At present, there are three journalists in custody for cases under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. One of them is sentenced to life imprisonment. Many are also charged under criminal defamation suits by and publishing houses have been sued on contempt charges to curb free speech. Among states, Uttar Pradesh had 29 cases against journalists in the last decade – the highest in India – followed by Chhattisgarh (17), Jammu and Kashmir (16), Tamil Nadu (15), and Delhi (10).
A recent study by independent journalist Geeta Seshu discovered that 154 journalists were arrested, detained, or interrogated between 2010 and 2020 in India, and 40% of these cases were reported in 2020 alone. This study is called ‘Behind Bars: Arrest and Detention of Journalists in India 2010-20’. The research was done by the Free Speech Collective, which did a detailed analysis on the decade of summons, arrests, detention, questioning, and notices against scribes in the past decade.
There are now physical assaults on journalists that have increased with an alarming 198 attacks being recorded from 2014 to 2019, with 36 in 2019 alone – the conviction rate in the country on deaths of journalists is stunningly low. There have been over 30 journalists who have died since 2010 with only three convictions, per a report.
There have been 56 journalists imprisoned during the last ten years before getting bail. In 2020, Prashant Kanojia spent 80 days in prison for allegedly posting a tweet related to the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.
Presently, India is also the country with the most Internet shutdowns. There were at least 64 shutdowns were seen in 2020 alone. In 2019, the abrogation of article 370 of the Constitution saw one of the longest internet shutdowns in Kashmir, when the BJP government made it a Union Territory from being a state. Full 4G internet was recently restored after nearly 2 years. 4G is needed for business and work and its curb greatly afflicted their finances.
Caravan journalists, Shahid Tantray, Prabhjit Singh along with a woman colleague were attacked in the national capital in Delhi on August 11th had no action taken against the attackers. In spite of lodging police complaints, the police did not register an FIR. Impunity covered other cases, with weak investigations and no action taken against the perpetrators. There is clear networking between the cops, the government, and the local administrations, so justice remains evasive.
Journalist Ashwani Saini had five FIRs against him for a video report on the failure of administration during the lockdown and other stories pertaining to the pandemic; journalists Abhilash Padacherry, Ananthu Rajagopal who was arrested on charges of obstructing public officials when they were covering the Vadayampadi ‘caste wall’ in Kerala in 2018; among many others.
Our roots in the democratic printing press go back centuries. Printing operations started in Goa in 1556 with the first printing press established at the Jesuit Saint Paul’s College in Old Goa), where the first publication was Conclusiones Philosophicas. There was freedom of the press at all times.
Today, it is shocking to learn that “democratic” India with its roots of over a century in “official” democracy is falling down. Now in recent times, India has been noted globally to be slipping lower on indices that measure the safety of journalists and freedom of expression in the country.
We could say even before our formal Constitution, India has not restricted its press, which reported news freely as it was, is now sliding to the low ebbs in freedom of speech.
In the past, India lived beautifully unlike its autocratic neighbors where no one called others rice bags, Jihadi, or abused “secularists” calling them urban Naxals. In those days, they lived in relative peace and harmony. Today, with the curb of freedom of speech, hatred to the journalists and activists is rising because they reveal the truths on the ground of the new intolerances and hate speech.
Freedom of press and media must be protected in order to strengthen the democratic fiber of India and enhance its flavors of diversity in its potpourri bowl of essences of cultures, religions, traditions, opinions blended to make us a unique democratic conglomerate. Our distinctive diversity was held together magically and we must revive it again!