This is not fake news. We have the exact count of the number of times the police stormed the houses of journalists and others associated with NewsClick on October 3, thanks to the FIR filed by ACP Lalit Mohan Negi, of the Special Cell, Delhi Police, in a Patiala Court: Raids were conducted in 88 locations, 81 in Delhi and others elsewhere in the country.
The almost military-like proportions of Operation NewsClick signals the exceptional institutional energy that the Modi government has expended on it. There is also no mistaking its intent. It is a declaration that journalism can only exist on the terms set by the state, otherwise it will be crushed and the capacity of professionals to carry on with their journalistic work will be taken away from them, just like their devices were on October 3.
No question of warrants.
No question of receipts and hash values.
Just a systematic dismantling of their capacity to think, question, reason, document, report, write, speak.
We often resort to lazy terms to define times we are barreling through. We term it a second emergency, an undeclared emergency, a silent emergency. Perhaps it is time to search for other terminology to define the era. In fact, the author of Emergency Chronicles, Indira Gandhi and Democracy’s Turning Point (‘Prof Gyan Prakash: Wrong to Compare 1975 Emergency to Today. This is Way More Dangerous’, October 5) believes there is something completely sui generis about the present situation.
Two things, for him, stand out:
One, the relentless effort to clear the public sphere of any dissent. Any thought that deviates from what is officially prescribed is already suspect; potentially any human being who thinks is a suspect.
Two, the attempt is to achieve a total domination by killing the juridical person in a citizen. This is done, he says, by “creating a system of law that is outside the penal system”.
So you charge the journalist with an anti-terror law like UAPA. This is comparable, he argues, to how the concentration camp functioned outside the juridical system. “You create a criminal, a terrorist, by completely killing all the juridical protection that a human being has under a system of law”.
If you go through the FIR filed by ACP Mohan Negi, a certain anxiety is writ large over it. The case is made out (of course, no evidence is required at this stage, they have UAPA don’t they?) that NewsClick, an organisation of modest proportions, based in a modest neighbourhood (in spite of the extravagant claims being made about it) is on the job of doing nothing less than disrupting the “sovereignty and territorial integrity of India”. This fear is expressed at least three times in a text that is a little over a thousand words. Words like these put a genuine fear, not just in the minds of journalists reporting the story and readers who read or view it, but in the minds of judges called upon to adjudicate on it.
It would have been good if this FIR had been dissected by the larger Indian media, those which have spacious offices in the national capital region and don’t have to operate out of cramped spaces like NewsClick. It would have been great if they had tried to contextualise that irrational fear that Negi and his constabulary are expressing. In an earlier era that may have been possible. Today that police FIR has been met only the silence of the grave which unfortunately could become the right metaphor to describe the Indian media in the very near future.
This is why journalists, those who have the courage, should not allow themselves the luxury of ever forgetting those 88 knocks on the front door by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police.
Journalists at the Press Club of India, New Delhi, at the release of the joint letter to CJI Chandrachud. Photo: The Wire.
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Look at those images from Gaza again: What do they tell you?
Consider some of the images of the war raging in Israel-Palestine that we have all just seen – on television, on our social media feeds, on newspaper pages. They throw us into a spiral of doubt about our very faculties of comprehension.
Palestine represents a unique and abysmal moral and political failure for the human community. The world’s major powers have wilfully allowed injustice after injustice to pile up against the Palestinians, beginning with that very first foundational lie that gave rise to Israel: A land without a people, for a people without a land. Palestine was not a land without a people.
Today, 75 years after the Nakba (‘catastrophe’ in Arabic) that visited Palestinians with the establishment of Israel, the world and its institutions have to ask themselves whether their human rights codes, international laws and conventions, are worth the paper they are on. As for the media, they need to ask themselves how much they have contributed to the rubble that is slowly asphyxiating the people of Gaza by failing this story.
It is not as if powerful reportage has not emanated from this region. Robert Fisk, reporting for The Times (London) on the massacre at Shatila, Lebanon, in September 1982, could have been reporting on the present war:
“Even twenty four hours after the massacre… no one was sure how many had been killed. Down every alleyway there were corpses – women, young men, babies and grandparents – lying together in lazy and terrible profusion…Each corridor through the rubble produced more bodies…”
But the story of Palestine has never been allowed a free run to yield up its truths. Those who have hijacked it have created and circulated their own master narratives, creating the conditions for the apartheid state that Israel has become, with its forced occupation and massacres, time after sickening time. Today, we are witnessing a region of over two million people under the threat of being wiped out, with the world’s most powerful countries standing by and allowing the brutal scenario to perpetuate itself in the name of justice for Israel.
So how is the story being framed today?
In her analysis, ‘Telling the Palestinian story: An uphill battle against Western media bias’, written over a year ago, Palestinian academic, Dr Abeer Al-Najjar, points to editorial policies that “erase the huge power asymmetry between both parties” – Israel and Palestine. The very structures of media houses – deeply enmeshed in the foreign policies of the countries they function from – ensure that the “globally recognised journalistic values of accuracy, fairness, and balance” are discarded. News sources are overwhelmingly biased towards Israel; Palestinian sources are underplayed or, worse, the coverage consciously frames Palestine as non-human. In some newsrooms, even the word “Palestine” is verboten and with it is the general erasure of any awareness about Israel’s unrelenting, often murderous, military occupation of Palestinian land.
Destruction in Gaza following Hamas-Israel war. Photo: X(Twitter)/UNRWA
Journalists courageous enough to break through these deceits face immediate blowback, ranging from being labeled “anti-Semite” to being fired. In this way, through both institutional censorship and self-censorship, the dominant pro-Israeli narrative remains the de facto one.
Many of the observations made by Dr Al-Najjar a year ago are proving devastatingly true in the present coverage. The first ever armed intrusion into Israel by Hamas on October 7 must be strongly condemned for the massacre of civilians, as also the immensely disturbing capture and abduction of Israeli citizens by Hamas militia. The fact remains that it is these images that are playing on a loop over screens across the world and are dominating the news space even here in India. Simultaneously, the agony and trauma of the inhabitants of Gaza staring at death is viewed, directly or tangentially, through the prism of collective punishment. Some of this coverage ( it is almost difficult to believe) has a triumphalist, they-asked-for-it, tone, focusing on long-distance shots of bombed out buildings, and dark skylines as another night descends without power supply. Hamas’s “terrorism” is played up at full volume, while the “terrorism” Israel has been, and is, perpetrating in the region is muted, most often deliberately. Even a single word in a report can change this story. As a tweet to the BBC recently pointed out, how is it that in BBC commentary “Palestinians die”, while “Israelis are killed”.
What was also very apparent this time was the flood of fake news and images unleashed by both sides. Since attacks on young lives create instant revulsion, much of the fake content featured children. The story of Israeli soldiers kidnapping two Palestinian girls, aged three and six, did the rounds before being exposed as disinformation. The “beheaded babies” story was allowed to circulate for a very long time before its veracity was denied. Meanwhile it impacted perceptions and policies across the world, including at the White House.
The CNN talking head who repeated that “Israeli babies were beheaded” admits journalistic malpractice.
You have blood on your hands. https://t.co/yT7KGarJPP
— Mohammed El-Kurd (@m7mdkurd) October 13, 2023
It’s a time when every journalist entity that still has a moral compass needs to play its role in countering these layers upon layers of disinformation spun as fine as a tarantula’s web. There are respected figures who understand this story and are prepared to speak out, and their voices need to be amplified to counter some of the mass apathy, cynicism and ignorance that backdrops this war. The Wire needs to be commended for putting out some powerful interviews (‘Watch: Israel Wants to Annihilate Palestinian People, Says Mustafa Barghouti’ October 12; ‘Watch | Invading Gaza Will Be Israel’s Biggest Ever War Crime: Haaretz Columnist Gideon Levy’, October 13).
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Readers and friends of NewsClick write in…
Egregious assault on NewsClick
Justice K. Chandru, Chennai: “Attack against NewsClick is not accidental. It is a planned attack. The ugly face of fascism is once again rearing its head. When Jayaprakash Narayan said in 1975 that “it was vinasakale vibaritha buddhi” (in times of impending doom, judgment falters), it came to be proved in reality. After 22 months of the Emergency she, Indira Gandhi, was shown the door. Now we are in a period of undeclared emergency. Had Jayaprakash Narayan been alive he would have repeated that statement today.”
Dr Imrana Qadeer, former professor, JNU: “The assault on free thought, reason and independent thinking is the saddest thing that can happen in a democracy. NewsClick is not alone in this struggle!”
Ram Ramaswamy, scientist and academic: “Prabir Purkayastha’s commitment to Indian democracy is deep and sustained. His voice cannot and should not be suppressed…”
Shabnam Hashmi, social activist: “The October 3 raids on more than a hundred homes early in the morning reminded me of some line of Rajesh Joshi: “Jo iss pagalpan mein shamil nahi hoga, mare jayenge…”
“Those who do not join this madness will be killed/
Will be put in the dock/
Those who will speak in opposition/
Those who speak the truth, will be killed/
The biggest crime is to be unarmed and innocent at this time/
Those who are not criminals, will be killed…”
That all-round attack on NewsClick, its founder Prabir Purkayastha, its present and former employees; well-known journalists like Bhasha Singh, Abhisar Sharma, Urmilesh; intellectuals like Dilip Simeon, Sohail Hashmi, and many others, is sheer vendetta. They have been targeted for daring to speak out and defy the one-sided narrative being pushed down our throats by screeching anchors. It is also to send a strong signal to those who are still speaking and to divert public attention away from unemployment, inflation, poverty and the Adani-Modi nexus exposed notably by former editor Paranjoy Guha Thakurta. I strongly condemn this witch hunting.”
Lalita Ramdas, anti-nuclear activist: “In my forward to Prabir’s recently published memoir, Fighting the Good Fight, I ventured to say that the outstanding quality of the man, the book and his many ’good fights’, was the sense of how the personal and the political converged and blended so seamlessly. I have known him for around four decades. Far from encouraging terror, he epitomises for me integrity, compassion love and peace…May the agencies who have taken you in so blindly and thoughtlessly, Prabir, realise that your gentle smile, deep intellect and loving heart will overcome and win this good fight too.”
Apoorvanand, professor, Delhi University: “NewsClick and Prabir are being punished for showing the mirror to power and telling truth to the people when Big Media is busy hiding it. They are paying for making peoples’ right to know a reality.”
Harsh Mander, former IAS officer and human rights worker: “In an age when most of the Indian media have become cheerleaders of power and purveyors of hate, a few beacons of integrity and courage remain. Prominent among these is NewsClick, founded by the redoubtable and indomitable Prabir. Fierce in his opposition to corporate capture and majoritarian politics, he stood firmly on the side of the oppressed of our land. For him to be jailed on terror charges diminishes us all.”
Satyajit Rath, professor emeritus, IISER: “I am deeply disturbed by the persistent vindictive harassment and vilification, by multiple state agencies, of Newsclick as an organisation, and of Prabir Purkayastha personally, simply because of their legitimate, forthright journalism and activism that is critical of right-wing policies, politics and ideologies.”
Ramu Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff of the Indian Navy: “Little did I think that we would be witnessing the October 3 swoop down on journalists across the country, including against NewsClick, with Prabir Purkayastha and his colleague being arrested under the draconian UAPA for promoting ‘terror’?!! I admire persons like him for standing up for their beliefs. We met for the first time when I was heading the Navy in the early nineties, establishing a mutual bond that was unusual given our polar opposite spheres. Prabir even interviewed me on NewsClick about some of the ‘unorthodox’ choices I had made post my retirement in 1993! I tried to explain that I was taught by our civics teacher at the Armed Forces Academy, that we are first and foremost citizens with primary responsibilities to our people and Constitution. He also taught us to follow our conscience and to be fearless. It is these qualities that stands out in Prabir. I have no doubt that this too shall pass…”
Bezwada Wilson, national convenor, Safai Karmachari Andolan: “This crushing of the voice of NewsClick is, to my mind, like crushing the voices of the marginalised, the oppressed people of this country. NewsClick has always covered those stories that never figure in the media. It represents through its work the democratisation of the media.”
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Deathly disinformation on Palestine
Ananya Ray writes in: “Israel has been on a disinformation counter-offensive for the past several days that has been swallowed full-scale by Western media and complicit governments.
“There are lies about the number of those killed (such as 260 young people in a rave-up on occupied land; the beheadings of children; the rape of women). These are issues that would tug at the hearts of any human, especially in the West where many consider all Palestinians to be ‘terrorists’ and Hamas beyond the pale. This simply allows Israel to continue with its genocide in Gaza.
“The Israelis are a huge asset to the military-industrial complex of the US empire as purchasers and exporters of lethal weapons. However, one of the biggest military states in the world as well as being the fifth nuclear power has made a big strategic mistake. If they think that wiping out the leadership of Gaza will help them, they are totally wrong. Each generation of children will be growing up even more radicalised having seen their homes, families, fathers mothers, brothers, and sisters blown up in front of them and the world looking the other way.”
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Arundhati Roy: Why now?
The question that raises its head is precisely the one posed by the writer of The Wire commentary, ‘Why Is the Indian State Reigniting a 13-Year-Old Case Against Arundhati Roy?’ (October 11). The piece argues correctly that “The BJP has an elephantine memory. Nothing of these kinds of remarks is forgotten. Everything is remembered…Roy made a speech in 2010. It was not forgotten. She was at the protest against the arrest of Purkayastha and Chakraborty. The FIR against her has been activated by the LG less than a week later.”
But there could be an additional reason for this move. The fact is that those who comprise the Modi establishment do not just have a visceral hatred for Roy, they fear her. They fear her ability to use powerful words that sting them, her passion for justice, her global connect, her very fearlessness. They also fear that this is a writer who understands with clairvoyance how the carceral system works, the one they preside over.
Take the character, Major Amrik Singh, who jumps out of the pages of her novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. He may as well as been someone inhabiting one of the interrogation rooms of police departments anywhere in the country.
Amrik Singh ‘Spotter’, he was known as, for being able to spot the “snake in the grass, the militant hidden among a crowd of civilians…”
In the January of 1995, Amrik Singh had…apprehended a well-known lawyer and human rights activist, Jalib Qadri, at a checkpoint…Qadri was apprehended publicly, in the presence of his wife, but the arrest was not formally registered, which was not unusual. There was an outcry about Qadri’s ‘abduction’, so it was thought prudent to release him. But then it was discovered that he had disappeared. “A great hue and cry arose…A few days later Jalib Qadri’s body showed up in a sack floating down the Jhelum…”
Amrik Singh is a fictional character but he draws his substance from his more corporeal counterparts. By breathing life into him, Roy reminds us that what goes for “law and order” in this country can often be a dystopic subterfuge.
Write to ombudsperson@thewire.in.
