It’s a critical time for journalists. 

CPJ spoke to reporters and editors across India about their plans for covering these historic parliamentary elections in a difficult environment for the media, which has seen critical websites censored, prominent editors quit and independent outlets bought by politically-connected conglomerates, while divisive content has grown in popularity. 

Here are their biggest concerns:

Political violence 

During the run-up to the 2019 vote, there was a rise in assaults and threats against journalists during clashes between political groups, particularly in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, and Jammu and Kashmir, according to data collected by CPJ and the Armed Conflict & Location Event Data Project. 

“Our state is now very famous or infamous for pre-poll, and post-poll, and poll violence,” Ishani Datta Ray, editor of Anandabazar Patrika newspaper in the eastern state of West Bengal, said at the launch of CPJ’s safety guide for journalists covering the election. “We have to guide them [our journalists] and caution them about the perils and dangers on the field.”

Dozens of citizens were killed in West Bengal’s 2019 and 2021 elections, largely due to fierce competition between the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress and the BJP.

Datta Ray described how she spent the night on the phone to one of her journalists who was part of a group who were beaten during a clash between two political parties and trapped in a building in Kolkata, West Bengal’s capital, as party activists attempted to set fire to one of the reporters, whom they had doused in petrol. The journalists were eventually rescued by police and locals.

“Nobody should die for a newspaper. Your life is precious,” said Datta Ray. “If there is a risk, don’t go out.” 

Mob violence

Many journalists fear that they will not receive adequate protection or support from their newsrooms on dangerous assignments. 

More than a dozen journalists were harassed or injured during the 2020 Delhi riots, the capital’s worst communal violence in decades, in which more than 50 people died.

One female reporter told CPJ on condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisal, that she and a Muslim colleague were sent to out report without any safety gear.

“People were standing with knives and swords on the streets of Delhi and asking journalists for their IDs” to try to determine their faith based on their names, she said. 

The journalist’s colleague was beaten up and she was thrown on the ground by a rioter. After she posted about the incident on social media, her employer summoned her back to the office. 

“She said that everyone must be thinking that we are not protecting our reporters. I said, ‘Leave what everyone thinks. What are you doing? You are not protecting your reporter. In fact, you’re shooting the messenger,’” she told CPJ.

Datta Ray described how politicians sometimes try to turn their supporters against journalists by calling out their names at rallies and saying, “They are against us. Don’t read that newspaper.” 

“We’ve had to text people that ‘Just come out of the crowd … Don’t stay there,’” she said. “You don’t have to cover the meeting anymore. Just come out because you don’t know what could happen.’” 

Criminalization of journalism 

Since the last general election, a record number of journalists have been arrested or faced criminal charges, while numerous critical outlets have been rattled by tax department raids investigating fraud or tax evasion.  

For the last three years of CPJ’s annual prison census, India held seven journalists behind bars — the highest number since its documentation began in 1992. All but one of the 13 journalists recorded in CPJ’s 2021-23 prison censuses were jailed under security laws. Some appear in multiple annual censuses due to their ongoing incarceration. 

Six were reporting on India’s only Muslim-majority region, Kashmir, where the media has come under siege following the government’s 2019 repeal of the region’s constitutional autonomy. 

India’s longest imprisoned journalist, Aasif Sultan, was arrested in 2018 for alleged militant ties after publishing a cover story on a slain Kashmiri militant. 

Since 2014, CPJ’s research shows, at least 15 journalists have been charged under India’s anti-terror Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, which allows for detention without trial or charge for up to 180 days, since 2020.

Datta Ray also said she was dealing with a growing number of cases against local journalists.

“Every institution should have a very strong back up of a legal team,” she said, recounting how West Bengal police spent five hours raiding the house of Parkash Sinha, a journalist who covers federal investigative agencies for ABP Ananda news channel, which is part of the same media group.

“You don’t know if your write up, if your TV report, has angered any establishment, any police,” said Datta Ray, who worked with lawyers to advise the reporter via a conference call while the February raid was going on. “You can be slapped with any kind of charges.”

“They copied everything from his personal laptop and from pen drives … they cannot do but they did it,” she said. 

Sinha has denied the charges in the ongoing case, which relate to a land dispute.

Attacks by other journalists 

Under Modi, Indians have become increasingly divided along political lines — and that includes the media. Government officials have labeled critics as “anti-national” and cautioned broadcasters against content that “promotes anti-national attitudes.” 

In February, India’s news regulator ordered three news channels to take down anti-Muslim content that it said could fan religious tensions, while the Supreme Court has called for divisive TV anchors to be taken off air.

Journalists are not immune.

“Indian media is very, very polarized now,” Dhanya Rajendran, editor-in-chief of The News Minute, said at CPJ’s launch event. “We are seeing a clear divide in the Indian media, where one side is continuously egging the government to go arrest people from the other side, to take action, branding them as ‘anti-national.’”

She highlighted October’s police raid on the news website NewsClick, which has been critical of the BJP, and the arrest of its editor Prabir Purkayastha, who remains behind bars on terrorism charges for allegedly receiving money from China.

“We saw many Indian TV anchors go on air and ask for the arrest of the editor Prabir. They continue to call him all kinds of names,” said Rajendran, as she called for more solidarity among journalists and newsrooms.

Online harassment

Ismat Ara was among 20 Muslim women journalists whose pictures and personal information were shared for a virtual “auction” in 2022 by an online app called Bulli Bai, a derogatory term to describe Muslim women. Ara filed a police complaint which led to the arrest of the app’s creators.

Trolling is still a regular occurrence for her. This month, she posted on social media about being on an election assignment in the northern state of Uttarakhand, which is known for its Hindu pilgrimage sites. One of the comments on X, formerly known as Twitter, said, “In future you will have to apply for visa to visit these places in India.”

Since she was chased by a mob at the Delhi riots, Ara said she usually hides her Muslim identity while reporting.

“I think it helps not to be visibly Muslim,” she said, adding that she removed a picture of herself in a hijab on X after a BJP aide asked for her handle to check for “negative stories.” 

Some journalists at The News Minute receive abusive comments whenever they publish stories, Rajendran said.

“People have disturbed sleep patterns, they lose their confidence, they self-censor themselves, they do not want to tweet out stories,” she said, urging journalists to talk about their experiences with friends and colleagues.

Online censorship

In recent years, India has become a world leader in imposing internet shutdowns, according to the digital rights group Access Now. 

Government requests to platforms like X, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, to take down or block content and handles in India for defamation, impersonation, privacy and security, or inflammatory content have increased multifold in the last few years. From October to December 2023, India had the most video takedowns globally with over 2 million YouTube videos removed. 

In early April, YouTube blocked prominent Hindi language news channels Bolta Hindustan and National Dastak without explanation. 

On Tuesday, X said it had blocked several posts by politicians and parties, which made unverified claims about their opponents, in compliance with orders from the Election Commission of India, while noting that “we disagree with these actions” on freedom of expression grounds. 

Digital rights experts have criticized India for failing to respect a 2015 Supreme Court order to provide an outlet that has allegedly produced offensive content with a copy of the blocking order and an opportunity to be heard by a government committee before taking action.

Device hacking 

Digital security is another growing concern. After The News Minute was raided by the income tax department, Rajendran said she organized a training for her staff on how to respond if an agency wants to take your device or arrest you.

Siddharth Varadarajan, editor of The Wire news website, has been repeatedly targeted with Pegasus spyware. 

“We need to fight for our right to work as journalists without this sort of intrusive, illegal surveillance,” he told CPJ. “A first step is to educate ourselves and devise technologically sound strategies to cope with surveillance.” 

In the wake of the revelations, Varadarajan’s devices were analyzed by a committee established by the Supreme Court but its findings have not been made public. 

“Until recently, journalists were primarily trained to uncover and disseminate the truth,” Rajendran concluded. 

“In today’s landscape, it is equally vital to educate both aspiring journalists and seasoned professionals on methods to safeguard themselves, their sources, and their personal devices.”

B.P. Gopalika and Naresh Kumar, chief secretaries of the states of West Bengal, and Delhi, respectively, did not respond to CPJ’s emails seeking comment on authorities’ efforts to protect journalists during the election.

Secretary of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Sanjay Jaju did not respond to CPJ’s email seeking comment on social media censorship. 

Secretary of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology S. Krishnan did not respond to CPJ’s email seeking comment on the allegations of hacking.

CPJ’s India Election Safety Kit is available in English, हिंदी, ಕನ್ನಡ, தமிழ் and বাংলা

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Kunal Majumder/CPJ India Representative.

NDTV has used a still from the video as the Feature Image in its report of the Papua New Guinea tremors. (Archived link)

NDTV cited Reddit user ChrisM707 as a source. His post had garnered 2.8k upvotes. (Archived link)

The Hindustan Times tweeted a compilation of several videos of the incident. The first of these videos is the viral clip (Archived link). However, a text superimposed at the top of the video reads, “HT doesn’t vouch for the authenticity of the videos”.

A powerful earthquake of 7.6 magnitude ripped through Papua New Guinea on Sunday morning. Three people were killed due to the landslides triggered by the earthquake. pic.twitter.com/feP74Mpjt7

— Hindustan Times (@htTweets) September 11, 2022

The Weather Channel also used this video while reporting on the Papua New Guinea quake. (Archived link)

This video was also tweeted (archive) several times with claims that it was shot in Papua New Guinea. (Archived link)

Watch | 7.6 magnitude earthquake hits #PapuaNewGuinea. US Geological Survey says the quake, with depth of 90 kilometers, strikes near town of #Kainantu. Power outages and damage to buildings reported in parts of the country.#Earthquake pic.twitter.com/pMo19W7PYv

— NCIB NEWS NETWORK (@NCIB_INDIA_NEWS) September 11, 2022

Fact Check

Upon reverse image searching one of the key-frames of the video, Alt News was led to an Advanced Earth and Space Science blog post by Dave Petley dated October 15, 2018. Professor Petley is the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hull in the United Kingdom. His blog provides commentary and analysis of landslide events occurring worldwide. This particular post contained a geological analysis of the lateral spreading that had been witnessed in Sigi Biromaru, a suburb of Palu in Indonesia, during the Sulawesi earthquake in September 2018.

In the blog post, Professor Petley uses screengrabs from the footage that was shot in Sigi Biromaru, during the earthquake. The photographs used by him match the viral video.

On searching the keywords “Sigi Biromaru 2018” on YouTube, we found a longer version of the viral video uploaded on October 7, 2018.

In the video, two important stills confirm the fact that the video was indeed shot in Indonesia. At 1:56 in the video, a signboard consisting of an arrow pointing downwards, and the text ‘MASUK’ can be seen. ‘Masuk’ is the Indonesian word for ‘enter’. Moreover, at the 3:53-minute mark, a typical gas station signboard is visible with the text ‘PERTAMINA’. According to its website, Pertamina is the national energy company owned by the Government of Indonesia.

Getty Images had also uploaded this video on their website. Provided to them by Dewan Dakwah Islamiyah, the video shows the moment a 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck Sulawesi Island, which triggered tsunamis in Donggala and Palu cities. The death toll stood at 2,045 at the time of the video getting uploaded.

Through a keyword search in Indonesian on Twitter with a time filter, Alt News found several posts about the aftermath of the 2018 earthquake on Sigi Biromaru. Out of them, we found some pictures and videos of the Pertamina gas station and its surrounding areas that had been wrecked in the earthquake. (1, 2, 3)

Situasi di daerah Biromaru, perbatasan Palu Sigi setelah terjadi gempa. Menurut warga disana, saat gempa, tanah seperti gelombang ombak berjalan. Kiriman gambar dari Helmi…02#DoaUntukSulteng#SaluranPemersatuBangsa pic.twitter.com/Z92hXO5Rkr

— TVRI Nasional (@TVRINasional) October 3, 2018

The number on the signboard could be retrieved in a clearer picture. The number read “74.943.18”.

While searching for the number on Google, Alt News was led to a Pertamina media file. The 10th page of the file contains an image of this particular gas station labelled with the subsequent number. Alongside this is an image of the shop opposite the gas station, which can be seen in the viral video as well.

The image is titled ‘Kondisi SPBU Pertamina 74.943.18 di Kecamatan Sigi setelah diguncang gempa 7,4 SR.’ (Translation: Condition of Pertamina gas station 74,943.18 in Sigi District after being rocked by a 7.4 magnitude earthquake). The bottom of the page reads, ‘SPBU Pertamina di Kabupaten Sigi luluh lantak pasca bencana. SPBU tersebut tidak dapat beroperasi lagi karena permukaan tanah di sekitar SPBU terangkat karena dampak gempa dan likuifaksi’ (Translation: Pertamina gas station in Sigi Regency was destroyed after the disaster. The gas station can no longer operate because the ground level around the gas station has been raised in the impact of the earthquake and liquefaction).

According to a Wartakota report dated October 8, 2018, residents looted this gas station, which is located close to Palu-Palolo highway in Sigi as it was not guarded by authorities. The report further states that the condition of the gas station when the Tribune was at the location was also very worrying. The entire roof and support poles were slanted. The ground had cracked.

Interestingly, this video has been shared with misinformation in the past as well. The same video had been circulated and viewed tens of thousands of times on social media posts with the claim that it showed a magnitude 6.6 earthquake in Banten on January 14, 2022. AFP fact-checked this misleading claim. This video had also been shared after another earthquake hit Palu on October 9, 2018. The truth had been subsequently clarified.

Hence, it is evident an old video of the impact of the 2018 Sulawesi earthquake on the neighbouring areas of Sigi Borimaru in Indonesia is being falsely circulated with the claim that it is the footage of the recent earthquake in Papua New Guinea.

The post NDTV, Hindustan Times share 4-yr-old video as footage from Sept 11 Papua New Guinea earthquake appeared first on Alt News.

This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Shinjinee Majumder.

Zee Hindustan tweeted the clip and wrote, “Atrocities on Hindus continue in Pakistan. A Hindu woman was beaten up with sticks over a trivial matter.” (Archived link)

Vinod Bansal, the national spokesperson of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, tweeted the video and wrote, “On one hand, Afghanistan banned girls from studying abroad, while Pakistan has resorted to terrible cruelty towards Hindu women. This anti-women mentality of jihadis cannot be changed.” (Archived link)

एक ओर अफगानिस्तान ने बेटियों के विदेशों में भी पढ़ने को प्रतिबंधित कर दिया तो वहीं पाकिस्तान हिंदू महिलाओं के साथ दरिंदगी पर उतर आया..
जिहादियों की महिलाद्रोही मानसिकता नहीं बदल सकती!! pic.twitter.com/m36I3gLEfw

— विनोद बंसल Vinod Bansal (@vinod_bansal) August 28, 2022

Divya Kumar Soti, a columnist with pro-BJP propaganda outlet OpIndia, quote-tweeted Zee Hindustan’s post, adding, “If Hindus are not taken seriously in India, then how will their condition be in Pakistan?” (Archived link)

Similarly, right-wing propaganda website Kreately Media, actor Manoj Joshi, Humanitarian Aid International founder Sudhanshu Singh, and user @MrSinha_ who has a history of sharing misinformation, were some of the others who shared the video with similar claims.

Fact-check

Alt News performed a keyword search and found an article dated January 9, 2022, on the Pakistani web portal Geo News, according to which an elderly woman was tortured over a land dispute in Sialkot, Pakistan. After the video went viral, the Sialkot Police took action and registered a case against 15 people. Police arrested nine, out of which four were women. Speaking to Geo News, the elderly woman revealed that the incident occurred over a property dispute which has been going on for the last 13 years. The article did not mention any communal angle.

According to a report published on January 10, 2022, on the web portal of Pakistani daily Dawn, there was a dispute between two groups over a piece of land, and they had an altercation over it earlier as well. On the day of the incident, an altercation took place once again between two women, identified as Munawwar Kanwal and Nasreen Bibi. Nasreen, along with her relatives, severely tortured Munawar Kanwal. Nasreen’s brothers grabbed Munawwar by the hair and dragged her to their village. There, she was slapped, punched and kicked. this report, too, does not mention a communal angle. 

On January 9, Pakistan’s Punjab Police announced on Twitter that it had arrested nine of the accused, including four women. Giving an update on the matter on January 10, they said they had arrested the tenth accused while the search for the remaining attackers was still underway.

معمر خاتون پر تشدد کے واقعہ میں ملوث ایک اور ملزم تیمور کو جھنگ موڑ سے گرفتار کیا گیا ہے،گرفتار ملزمان کی تعداد 10 ہو گئی۔باقی ملزمان کی تلاش جاری ہے تمام ملزمان کی گرفتاری تک سرچ آپریشن جاری رہے گا. https://t.co/HcQSORaqL0 pic.twitter.com/alwfRGcyqX

— Punjab Police Official (@OfficialDPRPP) January 10, 2022

Alt News performed a keyword search in Urdu, which led us to an article covering the incident by regional Pakistani news website News 360 TV. It also contains a copy of the FIR registered by the Sialkot Police. Here, the date of the incident is listed as December 31, 2021, while the date of registration of the FIR is January 7, 2022.
To probe further, we reached out to BBC Urdu journalist Sarah Atiq in Pakistan and shared the copy of the FIR with her. She confirmed that this was the FIR from the same incident, and moreover, the name and mobile number of the victim were also mentioned in the copy. On behalf of Alt News, Sarah spoke with the victim, Munawwar Kanwal, to look into the communal angle in this case. The victim revealed that she was a Muslim and denied any communal angle into the incident. The victim and all the accused hail from the Muslim community.

To sum it up, Alt News found that an old video of an incident of torture from Pakistan’s Sialkot over a land dispute was falsely shared by many social media users including Zee Hindustan, Vishwa Hindu Parishad spokesperson Vinod Bansal and actor Manoj Joshi as atrocities on Hindus in the country. The incident took place in December 2021 and all the parties in the matter hail from the Muslim community.

The post Zee Hindustan gives communal spin to video of elderly woman tortured in Pakistan over land dispute appeared first on Alt News.

This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Abhishek Kumar.