Not a single one of the politicians in jail is a convict. They are merely accused by the BJP that they have done something wrong.
Freedom House has said “the BJP has increasingly used government institutions to target political opponents”. This is a fact. Freedom House ranks India as being “partly free”. This is also a fact, and indeed it reflects the position of Kejriwal as much as it does of our country.
The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index monitors civil liberties, pluralism, political culture and participation and electoral process. In 2014, India was ranked 27th. In 2020, India was classified as a “flawed democracy”. Last year, the ranking was 41 and this was the “result of democratic backsliding under the leadership of Narendra Modi”. They made other observations about the attacks on the minorities by the government, which we need not go into here.
by Aakar Patel
14/05/2024