By blocking social media accounts, taking down a website and arresting a journalist, Narendra Modi's government has stepped up its arbitrary measures to stifle independent reporting amid violent clashes with neighbouring Pakistan. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns this unacceptable censorship and calls on the authorities to restore citizens’ access to information.
Military tensions between India and Pakistan have been rising since the 22 April attack in Indian-administered Kashmir and, in parallel, the Indian authorities have been cracking down on independent news outlets. The arrest of freelance journalist Hilal Mir on 7 May for a Facebook post deemed subversive is part of a pattern of criminalising criticism in Kashmir. The Indian authorities have also sought to stifle independent voices online by blocking social media accounts, such as the accounts of independent news site Maktoob and Kashmir Times editor-in-chief Anuradha Bhasin. The independent outlet The Wire has had its website blocked nationwide. This wave of repression comes on top of the ban on 16 Pakistani YouTube channels, including the channels of recognised media outlets.
"The arrest of journalist Hilal Mir on spurious grounds for a social media post criticising the authorities is unacceptable. At a time of extreme military tensions with Pakistan, blocking online media and social media accounts is a dramatic violation of the right to reliable information. What’s more, disinformation is proliferating in India — including fake images and content generated by artificial intelligence — and restricting access to reliable news sources only amplifies this information chaos. RSF calls on the Indian authorities to immediately release Hilal Mir, restore access to news outlets’ blocked social media accounts and guarantee the public’s access to information — which would send a positive signal to the international community.
In a statement issued on Monday, 7 May, an Indian police unit operating in the Jammu and Kashmir region — the Counter Intelligence Kashmir (CIK) — announced the arrest of freelance journalist Hilal Mir, a contributor to the Turkish news agency Anadolu, describing him as a “radical social media user” after he posted a comment on Facebook critical of the authorities’ policies concerning the situation in Indian Kashmir.
As military operations continue between India and Pakistan, India has ordered X to block over 8,000 accounts, including the accounts of foreign media outlets, the social network said in a statement on 8 May, without specifying which accounts were affected. The X accounts of several media outlets, such as Maktoob, Free Press Kashmir and The Kashmiriyat, have been suspended nationwide.
The Wire's teams also announced on 9 May that their website had been blocked “as per the orders of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology under the Information IT Act of 2000.” One of The Wire’s journalists, Arfa Khanum Sherwani, also announced on Instagram that she was the victim of a harassment campaign: after the journalist posted a message on X calling for peace, her personal details were disclosed by an account managed by an influencer affiliated with the Hindu supremacist movement.
On 28 April, the Indian government banned 16 Pakistani YouTube channels, including those of widely followed media outlets such as Dawn News, Samaa TV and Geo News.
