‘Dangerous precedent’: Reporter exposes crackdown on journalists covering India protests

Reporter of The Independent Alisha Rahaman Sarkar has described the police crackdown on journalists covering protests in New Delhi on 10 October as unlike anything she had witnessed during nearly a decade of reporting in India, warning that it sets a “dangerous precedent” for press freedom.

In an opinion piece published in the Voices and Comment section of The Independent UK, Sarkar recounts how police manhandled, dragged and arbitrarily detained journalists covering one of India’s biggest anti-government protests in recent years.

She wrote that the Narendra Modi government had turned the capital into a fortress ahead of demonstrations called by youth and student groups demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over a controversial revision of voter rolls that resulted in the removal of 130 million names.

More than 20,000 police and paramilitary personnel effectively placed the city under lockdown, detaining thousands of protesters, lawyers, youth leaders, opposition politicians, former chief ministers and at least 12 journalists. Some journalists were forced into buses despite prominently displaying their press cards, while others faced repeated obstructions as they tried to report from the ground, leading to multiple altercations.

“The crackdown on journalists doing their duty was unlike anything I had witnessed as a reporter for almost 10 years in India, all of them under Modi’s rule,” Sarkar wrote.

Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have long faced criticism over their treatment of the free press. Sarkar argued that the latest crackdown had set a dangerous precedent, threatening the safety of journalists on the ground as protests against the ruling party gained momentum ahead of the 2029 federal elections.

India ranks 157th among 180 countries in the latest Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders.

Journalists face barriers, detentions

According to Sarkar’s account, the restrictions imposed on journalists on Saturday were extensive, making it difficult even to reach the protest venue.

The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), a youth-led pressure group that has emerged as a challenge to Modi, had called for a demonstration at Jantar Mantar, an 18th-century observatory that serves as the capital’s designated protest site. The protesters demanded the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, whose oversight of the voter-roll revision has drawn criticism from opponents who say it disproportionately benefited Modi’s party.

Police sealed off the protest site with barricades and blocked roads leading to the area. Officers insisted that journalists would not be allowed through, Sarkar wrote.

“My taxi was repeatedly diverted away by security personnel as I tried to reach Jantar Mantar, forcing me to navigate the labyrinth of barricades on foot for around 2km. At checkpoints every 100-200 m, I was asked for my press identification despite the card being on display,” she wrote.

“Almost an hour into the walk, I was stopped by paramilitary forces from entering one of the roads, triggering an altercation and an unsuccessful attempt to snatch my phone as I began recording the incident. I was allowed to proceed only after I identified myself as a journalist working for foreign media.”

Sarkar also described the difficulties faced by her colleague Namita Singh, who had been at Connaught Place, a central shopping area less than a mile from Jantar Mantar, since morning.

“On her way there, she faced multiple checkpoints and route diversions. She was repeatedly told by police personnel to step back while recording the detention of protesters. The taxi she had booked for the day had its tail light broken while it was parked,” Sarkar wrote.

Journalists working for independent news organisations, including The Quint, The Wire, Scroll and Newslaundry, were detained alongside reporters from Reporter TV and Navbharat Times, as well as senior independent journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta.

An editor with Scroll said he had been detained in a locality in south Delhi while waiting for a taxi, miles away from the protest site.

Newslaundry said police had snatched and seized its journalists’ phones. Two women journalists were also manhandled and dragged along a road by police, according to the report.

Some journalists were released by evening, while others were taken to police stations. In almost all cases, police refused to state the grounds for their detention.

“Everybody claims to be a journalist these days,” police officers said in defence of their actions, according to Sarkar.

A reporter for Boom Live was detained at a location far from the protest site and released after three hours, the outlet’s editor, Jency Jacob, said.

“She was only doing her job shooting a video,” Jacob said on X. “The cops gave her no reason for detaining her despite being informed that she is a journalist.”

The suspension of mobile internet services within a 4km radius of the protest site further complicated efforts by reporters to transmit information from the ground.

Sarkar also described police using anti-riot shields to prevent journalists from filming detentions and blowing whistles in unison to drown out voices.

“We also witnessed police imposing a two-tier system for the press, allowing legacy media through while barring independent journalists. Officers turned away multiple journalists and asked most of us to show our accreditation cards issued by the Press Information Bureau,” she wrote.

Press bodies condemn crackdown

Press freedom organisations and journalist associations swiftly condemned the detentions and harassment, describing the actions as a “blatant attack on the freedom of the press”.

The Committee to Protect Journalists said a free and independent press was essential to democracy and urged Indian authorities to respect media workers’ ability to report in the public interest.

“Journalism is not a crime, and neither is protest,” DIGIPUB, an association of digital news outlets and independent journalists, said in a statement.

“If the powerful cannot withstand being watched and challenged, the fault lies in their conduct, not in our cameras or the people’s voices.”

The National Alliance of Journalists said the attacks were ominous and described the situation as worse than during the Emergency of the 1970s.

Imposed by then-prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1975, the Emergency remains one of the darkest chapters in modern Indian history. The period saw the suspension of civil liberties, the imprisonment of opposition figures and press censorship.

“Why not just declare Emergency?” asked CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke.

“The Government of India is at war with its own young citizens,” Saurav Das, a spokesperson for the group, said.

CJP emerges as challenge to Modi

The Cockroach Janta Party began as an online satirical initiative before rapidly evolving into a pressure group. It has emerged as one of the biggest challenges to Modi’s government after leading protests earlier this year that forced the resignation of the education minister in what the report described as a rare defeat for the government.

The summer protests drew large numbers of Generation Z demonstrators frustrated by unemployment and a worsening economic outlook. They also prompted comparisons with demonstrations that had previously toppled authoritarian governments in Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

CJP leaders have repeatedly called Modi a “dictator” and accused him of protecting the chief election commissioner, although they have stopped short of demanding the prime minister’s resignation.

Sarkar placed the crackdown in the wider context of attacks on journalists during protests across South Asia, where police have opened fire on reporters and protesters have burned down media buildings.

Such attacks, she warned, should not be allowed to recur in India.