No Prime Minister, please don’t repeat Indira Gandhi’s mistakes

Balanced reporting is dead. Indian TV viewer, newspaper reader and for that matter the voter is not a fool. The diminishing TRPs, circulation figures and the changing electoral fortunes all eye openers for those who are blind to reality

Indira Gandhi had attempted to be a dictator, imposed the dreaded Emergency in 1975 and been punished for that. She had imposed Press censorship and won the media ire. Then Bihar CM Jagannath Mishra brought in the infamous Bihar Press Bill seeking to punish the media for an undefined scurrilous writing. The entire Opposition had joined the media in vehemently opposing it and ultimately the Press Bill was relegated to the dustbin.

Circa 2023. History appears to be repeating itself. The Modi regime is fast repeating the mistakes of Indira regime. As we have been raising our voice of concern, the intolerance and hatred have crossed all limits and dissent is being dealt with an iron hand.

While it is quite fine for the government machinery to investigate any wrong doing even with iota of suspicion, branding those who dissent as Urban Naxals and treating them on par with terrorists has become the order of the day.

BJP knows the importance of media and the party right from its previous avatar Bharatiya Jana Sangh days has been known for its excellent PR. I have covered various events including the party’s national conventions in Mumbai. While reporting on the speeches of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, L K Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Ram Naik and so on. At the same time, we also reported the inadequate toilet facilities. Nobody objected and nobody said the media was anti-national.

Apart from the political parties, the governments run by them were accessible to the media since they believed in transparency and a free Press. We had questions and the government was obliged to respond.

The fact that India rank slipped to 161/180 from 150 in world Press freedom index speaks for itself. Strangely though, Pakistan improved its rating to 150 and in that country, even the Army and the ISI does not detest a free Press. In fact, a business magazine has been doing cover stories on the wrongdoings of the Army generals.

But in India, the Enforcement Directorate poses funny questions to the journalists that it interrogates: Have you covered the farmer protest? Have you written about the CAA protests and Delhi riots?

I say funny because it sounds as though it were some cardinal mistake or an anti-national activity for journalists to cover such events and incidents. Funny, also because this shows the mindset of the powers that be. ED would not have thought of such questions as it does not come under their jurisdiction.

The officers obviously play their masters’ voice. The harassment of select journalists who have been dissenting with the way the government functions is nothing but apparent attempt to test the waters to suppress freedom of expression, said Mumbai Press Club Chairman Gurbir Singh.

The club organised a candle light vigil on last Thursday to register its protest against the Centre’s onslaught on media freedom. “If the government tries to push us, we will push back,” Gurbir said and observed that the backlash would be severe. The current situation is worse than what prevailed during Indira Gandhi’s infamous Emergency. Indira had at least set rules for her censorship, but the BJP regime is ruthless, he felt.

What is wrong in questioning the government, in fact it is the duty of journalists to keep asking until they get a proper answer, said Praveen Puro, general secretary of Mantralaya & Legislature Journalists Association. “We should play the role of the Opposition,” said and lashed out at the Godi Media who play up to satisfy the rulers and deriding independent journalists.

I recall that during the Emergency, most media houses “crawled when asked to bend (to borrow the phrase used by BJP veteran L K Advani),” but nobody spoke against the dissenting media nor did they call names. I never heard any pro-Indira journalist or editor discussing the ‘sinister’ designs of anti-establishment media.

It is, therefore, not just intriguing but shocking that the pro- BJP media is being more loyal than the king and blasting independent journalists. Journalists should never play into political gimmicks, or at least that was what we old school reporters were taught. Disruption is welcome but certainly not disruption of ethics.

Be it the farmer’s rally, the Shaheen Bag protests or the women wrestlers’ agitation against the molestation and misbehaviour of Wrestling Federation of India chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, the government took its own time to act while the pro-government media branded the agitators as anti-nationals.

As per an India Today report, the Delhi Police told a court that Singh, a BJP MP, ‘outraged the modesty’ of the women wrestlers at every opportunity he could get. And the Godi media – lap dog rather being watch dog - has been generally silent on this.

One cannot expect anything other than diversionary tactics from the government when it is faced with uncomfortable issues such as the five-month long Manipur crisis, but the lapdog media amplifies this deflection by asking non-BJP run states about crimes in their States. The dirty tricks of the pro-BJP media have gone to new depths when they taunted Bajrang Punia for drawing a blank in the Asian Games as he went for the competition underprepared. Bajrang, the pro-BJP media said, was busy most of the year participating in the women wrestler’s’ protests. This is not certainly journalism. Every right-thinking person should have supported the sexually harassed women wrestlers.

The government may or may not have asked the media to crawl. But its policies have certainly vitiated the atmosphere.

Balanced reporting is dead. Indian TV viewer, newspaper reader and for that matter the voter is not a fool. The diminishing TRPs, circulation figures and the changing electoral fortunes all eye openers for those who are blind to reality.

What is also sickening is that some ruling party politicians keep whipping up communal passions before the elections so do the journalists who are in their pockets. Active or passive support to communal politics, silence on crisis and suppression of dissent are not in the interest of democracy. Nobody is permanent either in power or opposition. Fortunes do swing violently. First the Karnataka Legislative assembly results and now the Kargil Hill Council elections have propelled the Congress alliance into power.

This is a clear writing on the wall and indications of changing moods of the electorate. An ordinary Indian sniffs desperate attempts and would not be misled all the time. It is always good to learn from others’ mistakes rather than keep repeating them. Emergency by the Backdoor will have a huge backlash.

(The columnist is a Mumbai-based author and independent media veteran, running websites and a YouTube channel known for his thought-provoking messaging.)