India: where stories can’t be erased, the narrators are quieted.
The study titled Getting Away with Murder, there were 40 killings of journalists between 2014-2019. Of these, 21 have been confirmed as related to their journalism.’
The study further states that, ‘since 2014 there has not been a single conviction in attacks on journalists in India, targeted for their investigative work.’
Reports state that at least 14 journalists have been attacked, intimidated and harassed by the police force across the country from December 11 to December 21. Interesting thing to be noticed here is that a large number of them belong to the Muslim community.
The study also mentions how apart from the murder of editors Gauri Lankesh in Bengaluru and Shujaat Bhukhari in Srinagar and a camerperson in Chattisgarh, ‘all other cases of killings of journalists pertain to those working as staffers or stringers for regional language publications, reporting on crime and curroption in the Indian hinterland. At least seven cases pertain to journalists pursuing investigative work on illegal activities which included reports on sand mining, illicit liquor trade, land grab, water mafia etc.’
Another press freedom watchdog, ‘the committee to protect journalists (CPJ)’ releases an annual impunity index on November 02. The index is an analysis of Media person killings and attacks in every country over a decade, as a percentage of the said country’s population. The index also publishes/lists the countries that participated in UNESCO’s impunity accountability mechanism. It is a way to keep in-check the political will of a country to address and investigate the impunity. UNESCO mechanism demands details on the status of investigations into the murdered media persons. India denied to be a part of the said mechanism.
- Since 1992, 48 Journalists have been killed and 34 out of those were targeted for murder and out of these, 32 were murdered with impunity.
- In 23 years, ONLY ONE murder case has been convicted.
- India has been listed on the index 11 times.
- In 2017, India ranked 12th on the index with 13 journalists killed with ‘complete impunity’.
- In 2018, India ranked 14th on the index with 18 unsolved murder cases.
As per the Article 19 of the Indian constitution, we are given the freedom of speech and expression – both of which make up the spirit of journalism. Journalists must be given a safe environment for their freedom of expression to be exercised. The impunity must end for democracy to survive.
If this continues, the coming generation will have to continue paying a heavy price.