In Modi’s India, opponents and journalists feel pressure before the elections

NEW DELHI — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government are increasingly using strong-arm tactics to subdue political opponents and critics of the ruling Hindu nationalist party ahead of national elections that begin this week.

A decade in power, and poised to secure another five years, the Modi government is reversing India’s decades-long commitment to multiparty democracy and secularism.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has brought corruption charges against many officials of its main rival, the Congress Party, but few convictions. Dozens of politicians from other opposition parties are under investigation or in prison. And just last month, the Modi government froze the Congress Party’s bank accounts for what it considered to be non-payment of taxes.

The Modi administration claims that the country’s investigative agencies are independent and that its democratic institutions are robust, pointing to high voter turnout in recent elections that gave Modi’s party a clear mandate.

However, civil liberties are under attack. Peaceful protests were crushed with force. A once free and diverse press is under threat. Violence is increasing against the Muslim minority. And the country’s judicial power is increasingly aligned with the executive power.

To better understand how Modi is reshaping India and what is at stake in an election that begins Friday and runs until June 1, the Associated Press spoke to a lawyer, a journalist and an opposition politician.

Here are their stories:

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Mihir Desai has fought for the civil liberties and human rights of India’s most disadvantaged communities, such as the poor and Muslims, for almost four decades.

The 65-year-old lawyer from India’s financial capital Mumbai is now working on one of his – and the country’s – highest-profile cases: defending a dozen political activists, journalists and lawyers arrested in 2018 on charges of conspiring to overthrow the Modi regime. government. The accusations, he says, are baseless — just one of the government’s all-too-frequent and audacious efforts to silence critics.

One of the defendants in the case, a Jesuit priest and longtime civil rights activist, died at age 84 after about nine months in custody. The other defendants remain in prison, charged under anti-terrorism laws that rarely result in convictions.

“Early officials put forward the theory that they planned to kill Modi. Now they are being accused of being terrorist sympathizers,” he said.

The point of all this, Desai believes, is to send a message to any would-be critics.

According to digital forensic experts at US-based Arsenal Consulting, the Indian government hacked into the computers of some of the accused and planted files that were later used as evidence against them.

For Desai, this is proof that the Modi government has “weaponized” the country’s once independent investigative agencies.

He sees threats to Indian democracy all around him. Last year, the government removed the country’s chief justice as one of three people who appoint commissioners who oversee elections; Modi and the opposition leader in parliament are the others. Now, one of Modi’s ministers has a vote in the process, giving the ruling party a 2-1 majority.

“It’s a death knell for free and fair elections,” Desai said.

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Waheed-Ur-Rehman Para, 35, has long been seen as an ally in the Indian government’s interests in Kashmir. He worked with young people in the semi-autonomous, Muslim-majority region and preached to them about the benefits of embracing India and its democratic institutions – rather than seeking independence or a merger with Pakistan.

However, from 2018 onwards, Para was viewed with suspicion by the Modi government for alleged links with anti-India separatists. Since then, he has been arrested twice: in 2019, on suspicion that he and other political opponents could provoke disturbances; and in 2020 on charges of supporting militant groups – charges he denies.

The accusations surprised Para, whose People’s Democratic Party once ruled Kashmir in alliance with Modi’s party.

But he believes the motivation was clear: “I was arrested to forcibly support the government’s 2019 decision,” he said, referring to the crackdown on resistance in Kashmir following the elimination of the region’s semi-autonomous status.

The Modi administration argues that the move was necessary to fully integrate the disputed region with India and promote economic development there.

After his arrest in 2020, Pará remained in prison for almost two years, often in solitary confinement, and was subjected to “abusive interrogations”, according to UN experts.

“My crime was wanting the integration of Kashmir, and not through the barrel of a gun,” said Pará, who intends to represent Kashmir’s main city in the next elections.

Para sees his own situation in the broader context of the Modi government’s effort to silence perceived opponents, especially those with links to Muslims, who make up 14% of India’s population.

“It is a huge ethical issue… that the largest democracy in the world is not able to assimilate, or offer dignity, to the smallest group of its people,” he said.

The campaign to transform once-secular India into a Hindu republic may help Modi win elections in the short term, Pará said, but something much bigger will be lost.

“It risks the whole idea of ​​the diversity of this country,” he said.

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In October 2020, independent journalist Sidhique Kappan was arrested while trying to report on a government crackdown in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, ruled by Modi’s party.

For days, authorities struggled to contain protests and protests over a horrific rape case. Those accused of the crime were four upper-caste Hindu men, while the victim belonged to the Dalit community, the lowest rung of India’s caste hierarchy.

Kappan, a 44-year-old Muslim, was arrested and arrested before he even arrived at the scene of the crime, accused of intending to incite violence. After two years in prison, his case reached India’s highest court in 2022. Although he was quickly granted bail, the case against him remains ongoing.

Kappan’s case is not unique and he says it highlights how India is becoming increasingly unsafe for journalists. Under intense state pressure, many Indian news organizations have become more flexible and supportive of government policies,

“Those who tried to be independent suffered relentless attacks from the government,” he said.

Foreign journalists are banned from reporting on Kashmir, for example. The same applies to the northeast Indian state of Manipur, which has been embroiled in ethnic violence for almost a year.

Television news is increasingly dominated by stations promoting the government’s Hindu nationalist agenda, such as a new citizenship law that excludes Muslim migrants. Independent television stations have been temporarily closed, and newspapers that publish articles critical of Modi’s agenda find that any government advertising – an important source of revenue – quickly dries up.

Last year, the BBC’s offices in India were raided for tax irregularities just days after it broadcast a documentary critical of Modi.

Advocacy group Reporters Without Borders ranks India 161st on a global list of countries’ press freedoms.

Kappan said he has barely been able to report news since his arrest. The trial keeps him busy, requiring him to travel to a courthouse hundreds of miles away every two weeks. The time and money required for his trial made it difficult for him to support his wife and three children, Kappan said.

“This is affecting their education and their mental health,” he said.

This story originally appeared on Politico.com read the full story