Tag: Freedom Of Expression

What Offence Did Julian Assange Commit

Pray, What Offence Did I Commit!

By Amit Sengupta

“We were just crying and overcome by emotion, everyone was crying when we went into the lounge, everyone was crying and I’m still crying. It was… it was… indescribable and it was incredible.”
– Stella Assange, wife of Julian Assange

So what was the crime of Julian Assange? Why did he rot in prison, trapped, condemned, depressed, without sunlight and hope, for so many years? How come the ‘free democracies’ of the West chose to punish a young man who did nothing but restore the faith of society in the freedom of expression? And why did Chelsea Manning, an American army officer, as young, got equally condemned in solitary confinement in an American prison, for merely listening to his free conscience, and, thereby, giving away all the secret documents he could score on shady American operations in the Middle-East, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, as much as elsewhere, as in the death-camps of Guantanamo Bay?

Perhaps in only one of the few acts of redemption, former US president, Barack Obama, did one ‘yes we can’ with Manning. In one of his last noble acts before remitting office, he allowed Manning to be free. For a man who let a predator-like Hillary Clinton, his secretary of state, to unleash mindless wars in Syria and Libya, a woman who laughed like a blood-thirsty hyena when Muammar Gaddafi was murdered by a mob on the streets, this was truly an act of solitary redemption.

Even till this day, he has remained mum on the genocide in Gaza, with his buddy, ‘Genocide Joe’, directly arming the bombing and maiming of over 40,000 civilians, including over 15,000 children. Some things just refuse to change when it comes to American foreign policy, and it does not really matter who is at the helm – the democrats, or, the republicans.

While there is an international hue and cry that Benjamin Netanyahu should be tried in an international court as a war criminal, there was an eerie silence when it came to the mass murders unleashed by former US president George Bush. Tens of thousands of Iraqis were murdered, first by NATO strikes, then in a bloody civil war which ravaged the country, in what was an endorsement of the fraudulent theory of ‘clash of civilizations’ hatched by Samuel Huntington.

This is exactly where Assange comes in and marks a rupture. Once a cyberpunk who professed total freedom on internet, the original dream-sequence of this new cyberspace, which has since then been usurped by sundry predator capitalists like Mark Zuckerberg, Assange is an anarchist-journalist. He believed that all anti-establishment information which a journalist gathers through his sources should be disseminated far and wide, without any checks and balances. Wisely, he also believed that he and the organization he had founded, WikiLeaks, should ally with mainstream media outfits, to spread this exclusive public interest information.

That all sourced information should be released without an editorial filter — that is perhaps one of the doctrines which found objections from certain editors of media organisations who became his partners in this project, such as ‘The Guardian’ of London. Among other things, this was also what landed him in trouble with the western authorities, especially the US.

ALSO READ: You Cannot Jail An Idea

When he founded WikiLeaks he believed that the State apparatus in a democracy should be accountable, that it cannot be secretive in its dealings with its citizens. He also believed that if the State is doing compulsive and all-round surveillance on its unsuspecting citizens, then it has no right to exist. It must go.

This is the same doctrine which propelled another young whistle-blower, now in exile in Russia, to thoroughly expose the democracy in America by proving, with evidence, that citizens in this country were under the surveillance of the ‘Deep State’, and they just cannot do anything about it. Edward Snowden, in alliance with journalist Glen Greenwald, released this explosive evidence in the web-edition of the ‘Guardian’. The entire American establishment found itself in a soup.

Snowden had to pay a heavy price, a phenomenon similar to independent journalists in India under the current Neo-Nazi regime in Delhi – though nothing comparable to what he or Assange did — happened in contemporary India. He escaped to Hong Kong. And, then, spent several years hiding in transit, in an airport in Moscow.

So, what was the crime of Assange?

He effectively exposed that the war in Iraq, unleashed by Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powel, had nothing to do with resurrecting the seeds of a democracy in a totalitarian regime. It was clearly a ‘blood for oil’ war, with Cheney and Bush, reportedly, having direct interests in multinational oil companies like Bechtel and Halliburton. And, thereby, began the ravaging of Iraq, the hanging of Saddam Hussain, and the mass murder of millions across the ancient rives of Euphrates and Tigris.

Did they find any ‘Weapon of Mass Destruction’? Did they find chemical or biological weapons? Did they find any war planes ready to unleash a flood of bombs? So, what did they find?

Nothing!

That is why the phenomenon of ‘embedded journalism’ was hatched by the West, whereby not one drop of news could be wired without it being censored by the military establishment in the war zone. That is, all journalists had to be embedded with the military so as to report from the ground. Almost all western media outfits succumbed – including the likes of BBC. No wonder, Al Jazeera, though headquartered in Qatar, had to face the brunt of choosing to stay independent.

Grave adversity and crisis, inevitably, creates its parallel cinema. Hence arrived the box office star of Salam Pax. Probably a young girl, she reported from the heart of Baghdad, amidst the rubble and the ruins, the dead and the dying, the bombs and the fires of hell! She reported, nevertheless, without hope, but undying objectivity and resilience, unafraid, fearless. She reported! Every day. Without fail.

When almost the entire big media had sold its soul in the West, like in India these days, it is this parallel stream of consciousness which became the scaffolding of the alternative media. The National Public Radio (NPR) and Democracy Now run by Amy Goodman in America, became the new anchors of authentic, impartial news. Run by public money, independent of political or corporate links, they reported as authentically as they could, given the circumstances. The American establishment hated them.

As they did, the Blogger of Baghdad!

Since then, it has been a long and hard journey. Very, very hard. It seemed impossible that Assange would ever see the sun or the moon. At the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where a Left government in Ecuador had given him shelter, he did not see sunlight for months. In the prison, he seemed to be trapped in eternal darkness.

However, human will and resilience too is infinite. His wife led the international campaign – Free Assange! Writers, actors, journalists, students, women’s groups – people joined in what was an eternal ‘virtual march’ for Julian on social media. Celebrities came out in support. The American and British regimes came under great pubic pressure. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, once again, renewed unwavering support for the freedom of ‘Citizen Assange’.

More than 100 journalists dead, while reporting and clicking pictures in Gaza. More journalists have now dared to enter the vast graveyards through Rafah, doing what they should be doing. Thousands of students are up in arms in America and Europe against the Israeli war machine, the sinister Jewish lobby, and ‘Genocide Joe’ – tottering, doddering, faltering.

In countries like India, the independent media and other institutions are under siege, dissenters are in prison, including brilliant Muslim students, crony-capitalists call the shots, and corruption rules supreme – as in a banana republic. On top of it presides a fake non-biological prophet, wallowing in megalomania, despite having lost the mandate!

Hence, the freedom for Julian is more than a freedom of expression. It is a crack in the cracked mirror. It is a trickle of light amidst the dense darkness at noon. It is the belief, that if you are right, and resilient, on the side of truth, you shall overcome– come what may!

For more details visit us: https://lokmarg.com/

You Can't Jail An Idea

You Can’t Jail An Idea

By Amit Sengupta

The God of Loss.
The God of Small Things.
He left no footprints in the sand, no ripples in water, no image in mirrors.
Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

Now, they have got after author Arundhati Roy. After ten years of tracking her life and times, replete with balanced, critical and insightful resistance to the Neo-Nazis gone berserk, the Booker Prize winner and international celebrity, has become the first target of the fake prophet’s unpopular and hated regime in the scorching summer of June 2024. Certainly, all the heads of state in Italy are currently fully aware of his glorious deeds, past and present, at the G-7 Summit, including that he was banned from travelling to the US for ten long years, and became a global pariah, after presiding over the carnage in Gujarat, 2002.

Indeed, running a crippled government with a lost mandate, despite all the machinations of the Election Commission and his stooge media, discredited and rejected by almost half of the Indian voters, having just about scraped through in his own constituency, the ‘non-biological’ one has not changed his spots. And, clearly, he is refusing to learn any lessons from history.

The draconian UAPA case against Roy yet again reminds the nation of Gulfisha, Sharjeel and Umar Khalid. Indeed, have we forgotten them all — brilliant, young scholars, rotting in prison in this heat wave, for more than three years now, without a legitimate bail, imprisoned on what are widely believed to be cooked-up charges, with no evidence whatsoever?

Is it a crime that they are not celebrities, and, instead, are legitimate Muslim citizens of a secular democracy? Thereby, should they be treated as ‘second class’ citizens which Mr M wants to turn into a one-dimensional, repressive, racist and patriarchal ‘Hindu Rashtra’? Is it a crime to be a Muslim – modern, young, enlightened — in contemporary India?

Besides, is it not a recurring message, that once the series of mob-lynching of Muslims under State protection stopped, mainly because of the outrage against it across the nation, these scholars were picked up and punished, only because they were peaceful dissenters, articulate in their reinterpretation of a pluralist society, and firm believers in the Indian Constitution?

So, who is Gulfisha?

She is also called Gul. Gul means a flower. Perhaps, a rose. Gul has done her MBA, is considered exceptionally talented by her friends and family, and apart from other public causes, she used to take English language classes with local Muslim women during the non-violent protests against the polarizing anti-constitutional CAA.

Gulfisha, Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam (L to R)

She was not alone in this kaleidoscopic mass movement of rainbow coalitions. Led by brave students, especially women, of Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi, including students of JNU and other campuses, and the mothers and daughters of Shaheen Bagh in the neighbourhood, the protests had rocked the country. Tens of thousands of people were on the streets across India, and innumerable Shaheen Baghs were being born in towns and cities.

ALSO READ: ‘BJP Tacit Support To Revanna Exposes Their Misogyny’

That is why, Mr M’s best Gujju buddy wanted to send an ‘electric current, with every button pressed of the electronic machine, during the assembly polls in Delhi in 2020, which they so badly lost, yet again. Wonder, why should a Union home minister inflict electric current on his own citizens, and what a crude and ugly message it really meant for the women of India?

The deadly Delhi riots followed. Inevitably, one community suffered the most. And members of the same community, young dissenters, were all picked up and punished. So predictable is this perverse pattern! Injustice follows injustice, like an Orwellian nightmare!

According to a report by the Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) (April 9, 2024): “On March 5, the Delhi High Court’s Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain heard a petition for bail. The court decided to reserve its bail verdict. Gulfisha Fatima again was sent back to prison. As the probe by the police continues, April 9 marks four years of the incarceration of Gulfisha. She has been implicated and accused of violence during the north-east Delhi violence of 2020.”

“…The police had further claimed that she had had an office near the protest site from where she would take to planning riots with others, including those accused in the case such as Khalid Saifi, Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita, and her lawyer Mehmood Pracha…”

Natasha and Devangana were later released on bail after spending a long time inside the prison. They are both scholars in JNU. Their release should have marked a precedence. None of that happened.

Indeed, the CJP reported that after several such arrests, experts from the United Nations called the arrests politically motivated and called for Gulfisha’s release, along with other protestors. “These defenders, many of them students, appear to have been arrested simply because they exercised their right to denounce and protest against the CAA  The experts termed the arrests as “designed to send a chilling message…that criticism of government policies will not be tolerated.”

And what about Sharjeel Imam? Have we forgotten him also?

Sharjeel hails from Jehanabad, Bihar. His academic record tells a story, not found easily in most Muslim homes, not even in most Indian homes. He completed his BTech and MTech from IIT-Bombay and joined JNU in 2013 for his Master’s in ‘Modern History’. Two years later, he started work on his PhD theses. He has been framed with multiple charges and continues to languish in jail.

All who have met Umar Khalid, know him to be an affable, happy, friendly, resilient, forthcoming and brave young man, whose heart beats for the poor and against all forms of injustice. A firm believer in the Indian Constitution, his passionate and captivating speeches were mesmerizing, taking the audience to a journey of new facts and insights about Indian society, its past and present. He represented the modern aspiration, values and ethics of the young generation – non-sectarian, open-ended, always ready to listen to the others’ viewpoint, and steadfast in his faith in the idea of infinite resistance against all that stands for evil. He finished his PhD from the Centre for Historical Studies in the School of Social Sciences in JNU.

Khalid Saifi, his friend and comrade in the ‘United Against Hate’, is also languishing in prison. Similar charges. A big-hearted husband of a loving and brave wife, with three beautiful children, he was doing relief work in the riot-affected areas on the day he was picked up. He remains resilient and strong, though his wife and kids miss him like hell. Her occasional posts on the social media are heart-breaking.

Only a totally cruel and heartless regime can do this to a mother and her children — what they have done to him!

Delhi Lt Governor VK Saxena has now accorded sanction to prosecute Arundhati Roy and a former professor in Kashmir, Sheikh Showkat Hussain, under the UAPA, for allegedly making provocative speeches at an event in Delhi in 2010.

Besides the relentless hounding of the popular AAP government, Saxena has done precious little for the people of Delhi. The citizens of Delhi know too well, especially the poor, that all that they have gained under the AAP government has been unprecedented – fantastic, world class government schools with specialized skills and modern equipment for children coming from humble homes, free bus rides for women in the Delhi Transport Corporation, an end to the hounding of hard-working street-vendors, rickshaw-pullers and vegetable-sellers by the municipal corporation and cops, multiple body tests, hospital services and mohalla clinics with not a penny spent, and, of course, free water and highly subsidized electric supply.

Saxena has no credibility whatsoever. Now, the hounding of Arundhati Roy, will make him internationally famous – albeit for the wrong reasons.

Certainly, Roy is not going to succumb or compromise. Instead, she will become more resilient and inspiring. Undoubtedly, this is the time for the INDIA alliance, civil society and women’s groups, farmers, students, teachers, workers and ordinary citizens, to teach this totally corrupt and crony capitalist regime, without a mandate, a lesson. Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi, yet again, should lead this struggle for human and fundamental rights – and the Right to Dissent. And the Left should join them in the barricades.

The Neo-Nazis have been squarely defeated in the ballot box. This is the time for the people of India to hit the streets. Peacefully. If thinkers, scholars and creative writers can’t express themselves peacefully, than that society can never ever call itself a democracy!

For more details visit us: https://lokmarg.com/

It May be Time to Look at the Newsclick Raids Less Hysterically

By Sanjoy Narayan

The megaphones have been laid down now. The selfies and clips of journalists and others protesting in Delhi are no longer going “viral” (that unpleasant word used to describe when something spreads without much control) and the media have gone back to looking for the next big thing. As this week began, their focus, at least briefly, turned to the mass assault by Hamas, a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist, militant, and nationalist organisation, and the dark shadow of yet another war that could well be in the making.

Perhaps the slight sense of distance from last Tuesday’s raid by the Delhi Police against Newsclick, an Indian news portal, those who run it, and several people who work for it, is an opportunity for a bit of retrospection. The raids created massive ripples all over, particularly in India but also across the world. A protest meeting was organised; megaphones were deployed; and parallels were drawn to a 21-month period during 1975-77 when India’s then Prime Minister, the late Indira Gandhi declared a state of Emergency, and when, among many other deplorably repressive acts, many Indian journalists were arrested; newsrooms were commandeered by government censors and free speech was muzzled.

Many, including at least one of the few editorials in big Indian newspapers that deplored the raids, have called the police action an “undeclared emergency”, and lamented that it is an act of vendetta and unbridled harassment. Other, more shrill voices cried that it was yet another blow to freedom of expression, in particular, freedom of the Indian media, and an attempt by the government to silence journalists that are critical of the government.

The Newsclick raids were probably triggered by charges that the organisation may have received financing from an international pro-China investment group, which allegedly has questionable motives. Whether Newsclick received funds from that group or whether its activities were influenced by it are questions that have been raised and the Indian authorities have been investigating these. The raids were a part of that probe.

If pro-China organisations have infiltrated the Indian media and are influencing editorial policies that could conceivably be anti-India, it is a matter of great concern. It should not be anybody’s case that the media ought to be non-critical of or subservient to a country’s government. It definitely should because that is the role of the media: of holding a mirror to the face of power. And if the media in India are constrained from freedom of expression by those in power that is deplorable and unacceptable.

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What if there are instances where anti-government sentiments or editorial strategies are fuelled by pro- Chinese propaganda? Can that not be an attack on a country’s sovereignty? If Russia, say, influences a US media outlet by financing it and nudging its editorial policy, would the US authorities think it is all hunky dory in the celebration of freedom of expression? These are the sort of issues that those who wielded microphones to shrilly denounce the police action against Newclick should ponder.

There are two other issues, apparently related to this, but really they should be viewed separately.

The first concerns the raids themselves. Swarms of policemen arriving at the homes of dozens of journalists, including consultants, freelancers, and rookie journalists who worked for the news outlet and had little or nothing to do with its finances or how it was run is like deploying a nuclear missile to kill a mosquito. It is nothing less than pointless harassment and show of power, ostensibly aimed at scaring innocent individuals.

In the end, the police arrested two individuals–the top executive who owns and runs the organisation and one of his senior aides. Both of them have been detained under a law aimed at preventing unlawful activities, and it is believed investigations are continuing. If the authorities intended to investigate Newsclick’s funding, they ought to have done just that instead of coming down like a bulldozer against people who might have been no more than inconsequential cogs in the machine.

The second thing that the incident has led to is the focus on how constrained or not the Indian media is. The thing is that a considerable amount of that constraint is self imposed. Those who work as big fish in large Indian media houses would never publicly admit it but anyone with average intelligence knows that much of India’s largest media groups fight shy of criticising the regime in power, its policies, and actions. Some of those who run newsrooms in such groups may personally have views that are not supportive of many of those things but rarely do they make those views public via the media that they run or the content that they create for their audiences.

It is speculated that some of this happens because of tacit, “invisible” and unspoken influences that a ruling regime may wield. In some instances, it could come in the form of simple economics–a dependence on the government and its institutions to provide advertising revenues; in other cases, it could in the form of coteries that are formed when interests of business groups that run media groups intertwine with or are dependent on government policies; in yet other cases, it could be common political interests between those in power and those who run media.

The recent raids and the furore over them have swung the focus on these two things: recurring instances of highhandedness by the enforcement authorities; and the benign willingness of many media groups not to ruffle the feathers of those who wield power. Both are deplorable and undesirable.

Independent Journalists Explains NDTV Deal

Change In Ownership Hardly Impacts A Media Group’s Core Ethics

By LokMarg

Arun Singh, a Lucknow-based independent journalist, transfer of partial holdings in NDTV poses no threat to the channel or its journalists if they act as professionals

The recent brouhaha over Gautam Adani making a hostile bid to take over NDTV and thereby undermining media freedom, appears a little overplayed. I would call it premature over-reaction. The matter is very simple: NDTV took a loan from the VCPL about a decade ago which it was not able to repay. Seeing some business advantage, the Adani group buys VCPL and gets its holding in NDTV as the new owner! That’s it!

Now if this takeover or the deal is being propagated as an attempt to stop the company and its journalists from carrying on with their ‘revolutionary’ journalism or to prevent them from criticizing the government, then it is laughable.

By and large, the media in the country can broadly be distinguished under two categories: First, those who sell themselves (nowadays termed as ‘Godi Media’) and those who sell news (the term for them is ‘anti-establishment media’). Most media houses are owned by private business groups or, in a few cases, by political parties. The top leadership frames a set of rules and the workforce, in this case journalists, follow these.

For any professional media group to prosper, it is necessary they present news and facts on the basis of the core principles of journalism. Else, they are likely to fall into one of the two categories mentioned above. To my mind, while it is unprofessional to present only the good works of the Government of the day to curry benefits, it is also questionable to report only the negatives of a ‘strong’ and democratically elected government. Your credentials will be in question if you follow a set, premeditated agenda in presentation of news.

ALSO READ: The Reason Why Indian Media Is ‘Pliable’

A professional journalist will never compromise with ethics. And if a journalist is not comfortable with a group’s policy or structure, he or she has the option to look for work opportunities elsewhere. In any case, change of ownership has hardly ever changed a company’s policy dramatically. The clientele and viewership, as the market forces for corporate world, decide how a media group moves forward as a credible news supplier.

As far as this deal is concerned, it is not at all going to hamper anyone’s bread and butter or revolutionize journalism to the next level. I repeat, it is just another deal between two corporate houses and if one thinks (like it has been propagated on social media about freedom) that journalists will not be able to carry on with their distinct line of thought, one is fooling oneself.

As told to Rajat Rai

Pegasus and Beyond: Press Freedom at Stake

By Chahat Awasthi

As a rogue religious fanatic stood outside Jamia Milia Islamia, gun pointed towards students, a Danish Siddiqui stood in his direct range to get the perfect shot. He wanted to document a story from the point closest to action. He told the Guardian once, “I shoot for the common man who wants to see and feel a story from a place where he can’t be present himself.”

Siddiqui is not alone. Often in crisis situations when the world runs away from a threat, journalists run towards it. Such madness. Such risks. Such passion. Consequently, when some don’t live to tell their stories, others take up their cause.

However, in the recent years a pattern has been observed – a rise in right-wing populist nationalism across the globe and an increase in intolerance towards freedom of speech and expression.

The last decade, in particular, has been chilling for the profession. In 2018, Jamal Khashoggi went to the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, to never come out. Prince Mohammed Bin Salman told Bloomberg News that Khashoggi had left. It can safely be said that Khashoggi’s wife, who was waiting for him right outside, would disagree.

Allegedly, the currently infamous Pegasus spyware had a role to play. NSO (the company that owns the spyware) denies its use even as it says it doesn’t keep a list of targets – current and potential. How does one wrap their head around such conflicting statements?

Worldwide, 937 journalists have been killed in ten years. About 50 were killed in 2020 and 54 held as hostage in the same year. Some are missing. While journalists have been killed in cold blood, arrested for speaking out inconvenient truths and spied upon for decades now (maybe since the start of the trade), let’s not for one second feel that it is a normal order of the world – whatever it is that we are seeing right now, a lot of which is coming from conservative/right-wing populist and hyper-nationalist countries.

In Singapore, as the conservative centre-right party continues to rule, the “Switzerland of the East” has been painted black on the map of World Press Freedom Index. Journalists are sued left, right and centre and defamation suits are the order of the day. The cherry on the cake? Citizen Lab, the academic research lab that focuses on global security, human rights and communication technologies, found Pegasus infections here.

ALSO READ: Pegasus, What’s New About It!

The international organization protecting the right to freedom of information, Reporters Without Borders, says that this city-state is not far-off from China when it comes to suppression of Press. Self-censorship prevails and government decides what is incorrect in News. Words like democracy, press freedom, independence come to mind but not in a positive way.

Moving on. The United Kingdom, currently governed by the Conservative party, is considering changes to the Official Secrets Act of 1989 that could lead journalists reporting on matters that embarrass the government to be imprisoned for up to 14 years.  

Now, some would say that the core of journalism hinges on holding the government to account. The Home Office told the National that reporters would remain free to do so but it’s not yet clear how. The National Union of Journalists has responded with a staunch opposition, some calling it “actual fascism”.

But fascism comes in all shapes and sizes. Sometimes it looks like a friend. Technology, for instance, has created immense sophistication in our lives. There is so much to be thankful for. But some of it is operating on legal and ethical boundaries of personal freedom and private lives and some of it has crossed those boundaries. Pegasus belongs to the latter category.

After the Pegasus scandal erupted, BBC reported that about 50 countries could be clients to NSO, the firm behind the spyware that can collect some of the most personal and private information of people it snoops upon.

It’s critical here to understand that its commonness does not make it ok for it to be used world over. It should become more alarming. The fact that there is a community killed, mutilated, and treated as dispensable and that it has been handling spyware attacks at the same time because it is so common is not ok. What’s needed is support for it to thrive and not vile programs used by vile governments for vile purposes.

This very community in its varied image (good, bad, and ugly) is a major pillar of any democracy. Snooping, especially, at the level that the Pegasus operates on – the excessive and unaccountable surveillance – is antithetical to the essence of democracy and to the spirit of journalism.

While some governments can use surveillance for national security, at one point it must show prosecutions that show actual breach of this security or an attempt to justify such action. It cannot be a “snoop till eternity and without any basis”.

ALSO READ: Press Freedom In India Is A Myth

However, in India, the Pegasus scandal does not exist in a vacuum. There is a context to overall downgrading of press freedom. In 2020, India had slipped nine points in the press freedom index from 133 in 2016. That’s nine points in four years. Among 180 countries, we now stand at 142.

Our close neighbour Pakistan, which is ruled by a “centrist”, Islamist and populist party, ranks 145. It is also in the list of countries where infections associated with Pegasus operators have been found.

In India, though, the blow on this fourth pillar of democracy and subsequent fall in press freedom ranking is not in a vacuum. The assault on democracy has been duly noted and in the annual democracy index published by the Economist Intelligence Unit in 2020, India slipped two places down.

What looks like a mere journalism problem to the world right now might be a bigger democratic problem and now would be a good time to focus on this deepening crisis of freedom of speech, overreach of power and sustained assault on a major institution defining some of the most influential global powers.

At home, we need the fix the Pegasus issue. Our government must come clean. Did they buy Pegasus? Did they use it? Yes or no, with or without proper authorization? It is confusing for the common man to understand why a government would not do it already but give logically erroneous responses like other countries do it too, it’s an attempt to derail the data protection bill (oddly!), and how our surveillance is never illegal (help us believe it?).

To wrap up, the list of countries with populist governments leaning to the right and allegedly using Pegasus is not as short as some would like. The declining press freedom in most of these nations is concerning. The relationship needs to be examined. But, before we root for an Orwellian world, knowing what’s at stake might only be proper. 1984, anyone?