South Asia tightening press controls amidst COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has worsened the lack of safety for journalists in South Asia even as controls on media freedom were tightened across the region, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) said in its 18^th annual report released on Sunday to mark World Press Freedom Day.

It said the global crisis and lockdowns had highlighted existing inequalities and poor working conditions that exist for journalists in the countries of the subcontinent. But it said that South Asia’s media, and the unions and networks that defend it, continue to stand together in solidarity to push back against efforts at control.

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‘The media had the task of reporting the growing humanitarian crisis, working in difficult circumstances and amidst unprecedented physical curbs due to lockdowns and restrictions, particularly in containment zones,’ IFJ said. ‘The Covid-19 crisis has exacerbated existing fault lines in the precarious freedoms that the South Asian media has fought for and the most vulnerable are now taking the first beating.’

In India and Bangladesh, journalists came under fire while covering civil disturbances and protests. In Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, the fight for safe access to information continued amid election turmoil. Journalists in Nepal and Pakistan struggled against legislation to control content. And the challenge for critical media was as great as ever in Bhutan and the Maldives, the report said.

The chapter on Nepal said that violations of press freedom continued unabated, there was very little progress in ensuring journalists’ rights. It cited the Media Council Bill and the Information Technology Management Bill as two of the examples of increased state control.

It predicted: ‘The coming year will witness a struggle for press freedom as the government will continue to attempt to control the Nepali media, particularly social media.’

Even before the COVID-19 crisis, falling revenue meant that journalists were losing their jobs. But lockdowns in countries in the region and the economic impact will mean that the press faces an existential crisis. The report specially underlined the situation in Kashmir where harsh online controls meant that the state faced the world’s longest communication shutdown in a democracy.

The 18th edition of the South Asia Press Freedom Report – States of Control: Covid, Cuts and Impunity Today was launched on 1 May by IFJ and the South Asia Media Solidarity Network (SAMSN) and its affiliates during a webinar hosted by the IFJ and UNESCO New Delhi on May 1, 2020.

The chapter on India

In the period under review, the IFJ and its affiliates documented 219 violations against the media, including 52 jailings or detentions, 90 threats to the lives of journalists, 65 non-fatal attacks, 35 threats against media institutions, 8 gender-based attacks and 82 threats or attacks on rural, regional or minority journalists.

The report’s section on India documents the many attacks that have been made on the mainstream press in the past year by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It cites a ‘polaraising narrative’ that has begun to take form.

The report added: ‘Derogatory terms – ‘sickular’, ‘libtard’, ‘newstrader’, ‘presstitute’– for liberal or secular voices, or indeed anyone who questioned the government have begun to dominate social media and even mainstream news channels. This vilification included journalists and media houses considered to be “anti-government.’

Full report here.
Country reports:
Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.