Indian journalist arrested after he questions a minister over election promises | Hacker News Reader

Indian journalist arrested after he questions a minister over election promises

tribuneindia.com

Welcome to low level politics in India. Piss off an MLA or Panchayat Member, let alone an MP, and being arrested would be the least of your worries.

At least this guy wasn't burned alive like the journalist who reported on an MLA in the neighboring district committing corruption and rape in 2015 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Jagendra_Singh

Jai Jai Uttar Pradesh I guess

Siddique Kappan: Indian journalist released from jail after two years [1]. He was arrested in October 2020 in Uttar Pradesh state, where a young Dalit woman had died after she was allegedly raped by four upper-caste men.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-64494426

I mean if you're just going to lawlessly arrest people, why wouldn't the police just like arrest the upper class and take their shit? Why bother with some measly journalist.

The Upper Class have networks as well. Journalists, Police, Civil Servants - they're all "chamchas"

The police take their orders from the local upper caste leaders.

Lower caste too. Look at the Yadavs and the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh or the Kurmis and RJD in Bihar

Over zealous members and supporters of political parties have always done this in India. The difference I see is that they have become much more brazen in the past few years and don’t care about negative publicity. This along with draconian laws make it easy to accuse anyone (including journalists) of “causing a ruckus”, “hurting religious sentiments” and other vague and made up charges.

We are heading down a very dangerous road to totalitarian governments at both central and state levels.

It has actually become less brazen because now people have phones and record everything. It's just that you have social media and you get to see it more now compared to the past.

Agree. I am also afraid of the same. That is the reason I have started sharing here on HN. Just my little effort to save democracy.

Here is the original video where he is asking questions to the minister (He is speaking Hindi):

https://twitter.com/RahulMukherji5/status/163553639352619008...

Here is the video after he got arrested his hands tied with a chain/handcuffs:

https://mobile.twitter.com/yadavakhilesh/status/163564370315...

Pretty standard in Bengal, if you speak against Mamata Banarjee you will get attacked

So are you supporting this types of illegal activities because as per you Mamata Banarjee also does the same?

Will you also support a crime because other criminals also do it?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_wrongs_don%27t_make_a_righ...

No I dont agree or support this, I'm just saying all political parties in Asia do this. In Pakistan and India and Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, oppositions and governments.

This is fairly standard for India, especially UP which is the least developed state in India (along with Bihar).

If you want to see something really egregious, check this out. A lower caste woman was raped and murdered by upper caste men. The really egregious part - the woman actually ended up dying one week later and her dying declaration identifying her 4 rapists and murderers was ruled inadmissible. After a nation wide outrage the rapists were arrested.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Hathras_gang_rape_and_mur...

Once the news cycle calmed down, the following happened

1. The lower caste family of the victim could no longer find any work and feared stepping out of the house.

2. 3 of the rapists were set free based on a dubious report filed by the police which was hand in glove with the local upper caste leaders. The single convict was absolved of the murder charge because the woman did not die soon enough. https://www.thequint.com/news/india/hathras-rape-murder-vict...

3. A bunch of Muslim journalists were jailed for multiple years on sedition charges for trying to report on the incident, as per their job duties.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/malayala...

https://www.firstpost.com/explainers/explained-who-is-siddiq...

https://maktoobmedia.com/india/muslim-cab-driver-uapa-prison...

ALternate link: https://archive.is/bXtdg

Another puke worthy case where BJP leaders took out processions in support of the rapists and murderers of an 8 year old girl. The reason for the support? the 8 year old victim was Muslim

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Unnao_rape_case

Not only that, police forcibly took the victim's body from family and cremated it at midnight. [1] [2]

Siddique Kappan, a journalist who went there to report on the story was arrested and spend 2 years in jail. [3]

Wait if you think this is enough. The girl did gave a statement on video before death. Still it was not enough for rapists to get punished by court. [4]

[1] https://www.livelaw.in/news-updates/hathras-up-govt-allahaba...

[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-54351744

[3] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-64494426

[4] https://twitter.com/ambedkariteIND/status/163127977160595046...

I think you meant to link to the Jammu rape case in your last one

Yes, it was this one: [1]

My heart bleeds still thinking about this case. Please avoid reading if you are of weak heart. :(

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathua_rape_case

A ruckus!

Yup, anyone asking questions to government is "causing ruckus" according to them. :(

Without the accent and grammar mistakes a lot of Indian English feels like something an arrogant 19th century British aristocrat would say.

I wonder if that is also the case in countries that were occupied by other European powers.

> the accent and grammar mistakes

Liston to Winston Churchill circa 1909 [1]. The modern Indian accent is a ringer for upper-class colonial English.

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=L1i0jhPledU

Probably true.

I became aware at some point that "Please do the needful" is actually proper British and American English which died out 100 years ago.

Quebec uses some quaint French here and there. Many diasporas ossify some of their original languages, but not always.

I do prefer their numbers to actual bonafide French from France numbers. Numbers like Seventy and eighty, for example.

What, you don't enjoy saying four twenties ten and seven?

A little different in USA...question some authority and next thing you know that authority is paying extra special attention to you and your clients (cause we're all overseen by the same agency). At least with FOIA we can get some of the details. And no arrests; just fines and hassle.

https://theintercept.com/2023/02/05/ron-desantis-florida-vil...

A governor popular enough to be considered for presidential run put a local official in jail for getting in the way of a developer family that had enough pull with the governor.

> On January 30, 2023, a gaunt, 72-year-old Oren Miller — by then a former commissioner, ousted from his seat by a DeSantis decree — was brought handcuffed into the Marion County Courthouse. He had lost 20-plus pounds in the 75 days he spent jailed awaiting sentencing on a felony charge for, essentially, nothing. Or, perhaps more accurately, for fighting back against a powerful, well-heeled ally of Gov. Ron DeSantis.

This situation is horrific and should have never happened, but to be clear the prosecution was for violating sunshine laws. So the conviction was not for speech, but rather for failing to conduct that speech in public.

Edit: it was actually for perjury during the sunshine investigation.

The prosecution isn't the issue, it's that they put a 75 year old man, who was not a threat to his community and who likely wouldn't flee prosecution due to his age and his connections locally, into jail/prison for 75 days.

That's where the "political prisoner" part comes from. They can prosecute all they want for what may or may not have been a violation, but the overzealousness shown is obviously retribution against this guy.

That's not clear and correct. The conviction was about 'perjury' committed under a subpoena for the sunshine laws investigation concerning a fact (when the phone calls stopped) that turned out immaterial to the sunshine law charges. The prosecution of the supposed Sunshine Laws violation was not successfully completed. The conviction was for speech

I don't think perjury is usually included as part of free speech either, but I take your point. Edited.

A little different in Australia.

Report on corruption and have your house fire bombed

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/nov/23/polic...

I disagree. I've called Senior Legislative Aides and Congressmembers explicitives when I was still on the Hill and haven't had an impact on my professional career.

Fred Hampton may have opinions about how different things are… Or aren’t.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hampton

> And no arrests

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/policing/2023/01/12/p...

Yeah, there are sometimes arrests. And the worst part is that the courts actually recognize these arrests were unconstitutional, but because of qualified immunity these guys can't seek any redress from the police.

You sue their employer.

As of about a month ago, the Supreme Court said they can't, when they rejected Novak's appeal.

If you think things in the US are anywhere near comparable, you're severely underestimating how prevalent and severe this sort of retaliation/harassment is in India.

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