Teesta Setalvad reflects on the slide in India, once considered a leader of the developing world and a proud democracy that is today being dubbed “partly free” and an “electoral autocracy”.
https://thewire.in/government/story-india-2022-laws-weapons-democracy-slide
In 2021 –and the situation a year later is worse, not better –indices of freedom and democracy by three renowned global research institutions contained one common observation − that India’s democracy is backsliding, leading to a rapid and alarming deterioration of political and civil liberties.
[The three institutions, which came to similar conclusions on India’s freedom and democracy record in 2020, are the Sweden-based Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute, the United States-based non-profit organisation Freedom House and the Intelligence Unit of The Economist magazine. Specifically categorising the Indian situation, the V-Dem Institute study said India had become an “electoral autocracy”, while Freedom House downgraded India from a “free democracy” to a “partially free democracy”. The Democracy Index published by The Economist Intelligence Unit termed India as a “flawed democracy”.]
A key strategy that has been central to the erosion of democratic space, has been the weaponising of the criminal justice system by the State, to harass and punish those who dare to protest against the anti-people and anti-constitutional policies and actions of the government
by Teesta Setalvad
22/12/2022
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