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Transcript of Justice Srikrishna’s address at the RedInk Awards 2022 Date: Sun, 18 Dec 2022...

The buzz word in the atmosphere today is Ram, am I right? So let me quote from the Ramayana. I don’t know how many of the Ram people have actually read the Ramayana. A piece of advice given by Vibhishana to his elder brother Ravana was to tell him to restore Sita to her husband, Ram to save Lanka from being destroyed. Instead, Vibhishana gets fired. Ravana says you are my brother. You are against me? Vibhishana replies: What Vibhishana says is: Oh king, mighty king, people are always talking to you very pleasantly, very pleasingly; but you will not find a person who will speak the truth to you if it is bitter; nor will you find a person who is willing to listen to the bitter truth.

That Ladies & gentleman is a job of a journalist. To speak the truth to the powers that be.  Incidentally that is also my job as a judge.

Now two professions are required to be necessarily independent. Everybody else can afford to be not independent. A Judge and a journalist. If they falter, then the whole of democracy gets shaken up.

The first is called the fourth estate. Which are the other three estates of the state? The Legislature, the parliament, and the judiciary. Imagine a situation when they cozy up to each other? Then what happens? Who is there to take care of the situation? It is the job of the journalist to speak the truth to them and say: hey you guys are wrong here. The job of (truth) the journalist is to put the facts as they are before the public. The journalist who loses his independence, is as bad as the judge who has lost his independence.

Now there are various ways of making a journalist lose his independence. Gurbir talked about situations of threat. Threat by…. Raid by ED, CBI and you name whatever other the investigating agency. Incarceration for long periods of time with or without bail, constant surveillance by the police. These are some of the methods by which the independence of a journalist can be lost. Of course, there is the other subtle way, more subtle way of cutting off their revenues and making sure that the entire business itself collapses.

But friends, these are as rightly pointed out by my friends during the debate the incidents as they came. Now picture the game. If you are a cricketer, you are not going to be bothered about the ball hitting you somewhere, but you are going to stand up to the fastest bowler and make sure that ball is hit right across the boundary for a sixer. That is what the journalist is required to do and that is what we saw some of the senior journalists who have done that and they have been honoured.

To the youngsters, remember you are into a profession where honesty is really the best policy. Be honest to yourself. Be sure that your conscience tells you what you are doing is right. Now as a judge we always call it the judicial conscience; and I always say it is the journalist conscience which must tell him or her whether what that person is doing is right? Is it intended for the betterment of society, is it intended for the betterment of all fellow citizens? If this is the test, then you adopt it never mind what other threats come your way.

Yes, I mean I am quite sure I have seen the emergency and what happened to the Indian Express, how the Indian Express was harassed time and again by cutting off the newsprint, by cutting off the power supply, terminating the lease of the building. These are all the methods adopted by the powers that be all over the world. There is nothing strange about India.

I was told that we are still a free country. I also believe that it’s a free country. Yes, that there are signs which give us cause for concern. Gurbir gave a whole long list of them. I don’t want to go into the data. I assume that he has collected his data truly and represented it truly. If that be true then there is cause for worry. Cause for worry not only to the journalist, to every individual also. Is this really happening? Are the journalists being bumped off in this country? Some of them have been bumped off. Are the journalists being arrested for no reason. Maybe let off after five ten years in incarceration.

Are the journalists being subjected to this kind of open or veiled threat? if that is happening then the fourth estate is going to be completely denuded of its power to sustain democracy.

And when that happens ladies and gentlemen, as we said when Caesar falls, you and I all fall together. So let’s hope that such a situation does not happen. That the youngsters of the day are able to manage with the situation, face the situation, face it bravely and come out on top...

This time I ask why we only read critical reports about big business, like the Adani empire, in the foreign press or independent media https://www.newslaundry.com/2022/12/15/in-rare-reports-on-the-adani-empire-a-reminder-of-independent-medias-significance Today, not only are media houses treading on eggshells when it comes to the government, but they are also selective about writing critically about powerful business houses, especially those in complete sync with the current government. You see this every day in the choice of stories mainstream media chooses to highlight, and those it ignores.

In 2019, Scroll carried a detailed three-part investigation into the same power plant in Jharkhand. Her reports highlighted how the Jharkhand government, then ruled by the BJP, amended its energy policy in such a way that Adani got a higher price for the power generated. She spoke to the villagers who lost their land to the project, and also reported how converting the project into a special economic zone facilitated saving of taxes and additional profits to the company. 

Indian outlet on defensive after its explosive claims of Meta political censorship By Gerry Shih, Niha Masih, Joseph Menn and Naomi Nix https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/10/18/india-facebook-meta-the-wire/
The Wire is investigating its own reporting. It had alleged Instagram let the ruling party tamper with posts.

Extracts: (lightly edited for easy reading)

... In India, a massive and important internet market, Meta has for years been accused of turning a blind eye to hate speech made by government supporters against India’s religious minorities, particularly Muslims. Meta has also been accused of being overly deferential toward the government when it comes to content moderation decisions.

Wire reported that ...The California company had given an influential official from India’s ruling party the extraordinary power to censor Instagram posts that he didn’t like, citing a document leaked by a Meta insider. allegedly coroborated by an expert, Kanishk Karan.

Karan told .. The Washington Post that he was informed that Wire staffer Devesh Kumar had showed founding editor Siddharth Varadarajan, an email from Karan that supported Kumar’s reporting. But Karan said that had never sent that email.

Pranesh Prakash, a co-founder of the Center for Internet and Society in Bangalore says he believed Varadarajan maintained his personal integrity even though his publication had failed its journalistic responsibility. He told Prakash that Wire reporters had consulted Karan as a technical expert and assured him that their reporting was sound, Karan said he had never sent an email to Kumar offering his opinion.

“There is this propensity to see everything as right wing versus left wing, and the need to evaluate everything from that lens,” he said. “One of the pitfalls with the media ecosystem, and the political ecosystem in India, is tribalism.”

Comment: As an observer, one cannot decide if indeed there are people devious enough to plant a self incriminating story only to later damage the reputation of a reporter/channel/outlet. Or whether it was a case of a person back-tracking on a email under pressure.
While most of the stories tend to get the Left-Right polarity.. There is an increasing attempt to discredit the more effective centrist critics as extreme Left. or as anti-development or just plain anti-national..