Dear Modiji/ Smritiji,
I am a teacher and a published writer, from the city of Rajkot, Gujarat.
Today I was going through a few emails when I suddenly read an article. It was about the World Press Freedom Index 2018. Being an Indian, I got into the details about India. I was severely disheartened. Not only did they put India at number 138 out of 180 countries, but what they have written about our country is highly unacceptable.
Citing the reason of lack of safety for journalists in our country, they have tried to make their case stronger by giving the example of the murder of 3 journalists which took place in the last 12 months in India, including that of newspaper editor Gauri Lankesh. All was okay for me until I happened to read the last few lines which were :- "Coverage of regions that the authorities regard as sensitive, such as Kashmir, continues to be very difficult. Foreign reporters are barred from the region and the Internet is often disconnected there. When not detained, Kashmiri journalists working for local media outlets are often the targets of violence by soldiers acting with the central government’s tacit consent." Is the coverage of news reporting in the state of Kashmir, very difficult? No way. All national Indian channels including hindi and english news channels have a completely legal access to this region right from bottom to the top of it. Each and every news item gets reported. Sir, the tone of this paragraph is such that it is deliberately trying to diminish India's image as a democratic country globally. It is indirectly but very clearly saying that in the state of Kashmir, news coverage is almost impossible. Nobody in the rest of the country and the rest of the world knows what is actually going on there. The fact that foreign journalists are barred from the region is a matter of our internal decision-making process. What has this organisation to do with it, whether we allow non-indian reporters to go there for reporting news or not? Some parts of Kashmir are asking for a Referendum there since decades now but those are hardly 15 to 20% of the total population of J&K. These foreign journalists, if allowed will directly go into such areas and put forth an entirely different picture of Kashmir in front of the world, as if the Indian central government is trying its best to deprive kashmiris of their basic human rights etc. They will not care to look into the fact that so many parts of the world have this problem right now and it is not possible to give away state-owned provinces to just a group of people gathered together, with their weird demand of a separate country, for example, Catalonia in Spain, Scotland in the UK etc. They all want a separate country since decades now but they are not getting it because that demand is not universal in that region. Only a few want to get separated, whilst the majority have chosen to remain united with the rest of the country. The same situation exists in Kashmir too. But this organisation Reporters without Borders, wants that India allows the unnecessary intervention of foreign media journalists in this state and hence get divided once more. Else why should they write such a controversial line in their report?
The most objectionable matter of concern is in the last line, which says that "Violence is used against reporters coming from local media outlets. This violence is caused by indian soldiers under the tacit consent of the indian government!! How very untrue is this,sir!! I have been to Jammu and Kashmir a few times in the past and witnessed none of this scenario. The local journalists are never attacked or targeted by indian soldiers there. It is the stone-pelters which get targeted by our soldiers and rightly so. These stone-pelters are funded by separatists of the state which are fully supported by the terrorists groups across the border in Pakistan. So it is totally justified that our soldiers put into practice violent means to control them. But before this I have never heard of an Indian soldier attacking a reporter in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. This is a very new thing for me and it has got me so upset sir, that I thought to inform your authority about this issue. How on earth, can they defame our army like this? How can they spread total lies about our noble soldiers? When not even a single such incidence of an indian soldier attacking a journalist in Kashmir has been reported thus far, how does this organisation show so much audacity to give such a false information? No doubt, it is clear that this one paragraph is meant to spoil and tarnish the image of our country on the international arena. May be they are not able to digest the fact that India has been rising continuously in rankings like "Ease of doing business in the country" (where it jumped a huge 42 places last year) and hence trying to defame our country by putting forth such false information in front of the rest of the world.
I sincerely urge, Mr. Prime Minister as well as Madam minister for Information and Broadcasting, that the Government of India should take legal action against this organisation "Reporters without Borders", which is located in metropolitan France and warn them very severely against such manipulated fake news, so that it does not dare to tarnish India's growing reputation as a speedily emerging nation on the global front, with immense possibilities for growth and development.
Warm regards,
Kamlesh Bhatt
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