Indian businesses exert financial muscle to control press
In the late summer of 2014, Indian freelance journalist Keya Acharya found herself embroiled in her own version of the War of the Roses. That August, Acharya was forced to respond to a nine-page legal notice demanding that she pay a staggering 1 billion rupees ($16.3 million) to a company whose owner was upset about…
Mission Journal: Challenges for India’s press increase as Modi marks first year in office
“Modi has tightened the screws on information.” This statement from Bangalore-based journalist Subir Ghosh underscores a common challenge repeated to me by several of India’s journalists, who say the space for criticism is shrinking under Narendra Modi’s rule. Since a landslide victory made him leader of the world’s largest democracy nearly one year ago, the…