NewsClick and patterns of repression: The tiredness of being a journalist

07/10/2023

Newslaundry / by Jayashree Arunachalam

For a particular kind of journalist, life is supposed to play out in sanctimonious technicolour, just like The Newsroom. Speaking truth to power, telling the stories that matter, separating fact from fiction, holding people accountable. Did you annoy a government or local bigwig in the process? No problem! That’s par for the course in the quest for truth. It’s a badge of pride, almost, because you must be doing something right.
… Think back on arrests that made headlines over the past three years. Siddique Kappan travelled to Hathras when he was arrested. Mohammed Zubair referenced a movie trope. Disha Ravi edited a Google Doc. In the Bhima Koregaon case, an extraordinary example of police audacity, the police produced outlandish letters as “proof”, even as the police themselves were accused of planting evidence.
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Why UAPA is a threat to media freedom in India

06/10/2023

Frontline / by Venkatesan V

The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act serves as a powerful tool for the state to stifle media dissent and intimidate truth-seeking journalists.
The arrest of the NewsClick founder and Editor-in-Chief, Prabir Purkayastha and its Human Resources head, Amit Chakraborty under the UAPA has brought into focus the gross abuse of the Act by those in power to curb dissent. The First Information Report (FIR) names Purkayastha, the activist Gautam Navlakha (who is under house arrest in the Bhima Koregaon case) and the U.S. businessman Neville Roy Singham.
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Also read:
● FIR Given Only Yesterday, Allegations Untenable and Bogus: Newsclick (newsclick.in | by Newsclick Team | Oct 6, 2023)
● Chronology Samajhiye: 5 Days, 4 Agencies Under Modi Govt Control Target Opposition, Journalists, Activists (The Wire | Soumashree Sarkar | Oct 6, 2023)
● In India, 16 journalists under UAPA ; seven behind bars (Freespeechcollective.in / Oct 5, 2023)
● Report: UAPA – CRIMINALISING DISSENT AND STATE TERROR (PUCL / Sep 2022)
● Civic Freedoms in India ‘Repressed’: Global Monitor Civicus (The Wire / March 2023)

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Gautam Navlakha has a tremendous archive of writings from the 1980s to the present, documented by The Friends of Gautam Navlakha.
To read some of his recent writings and a full list of his articles with NewsClick, Economic & Political Weekly and the platform Sanhati visit: Gautam Navlakha – Journalist, Human Rights Defender, Political Prisoner