February 11, 2020
Rebel Youth — Jeunesse Militante and the Young Communist League of Canada — Ligue de la jeunesse communiste du Canada condemn the brazen attack on NewsClick and stand in solidarity with progressive journalists in India.
NewsClick, a progressive independent news portal, has been attacked by the right-wing BJP government, their New Delhi offices raided in an attempt to halt the spread of progressive, worker-oriented information in India. NewsClick has been at the forefront of reporting on the recent farmers’ protests to the ire of the Indian Enforcement Directorate, who have made NewsClick another victim in the reactionary government’s campaign against independent media. This raid on NewsClick’s offices, which lasted nearly the entire day of February 9th, is part of an attempt to silence and smear the reputations of Indian journalists as they take a stance against the ongoing pro-corporate onslaught against India’s agricultural workers.
The actions of the Indian authorities against NewsClick are, however, not specific to one target: they represent a larger attack on the voices of the working class, of students, and of progressive young people in India who struggle against continued nationalistic, reactionary, and conservative actions and rulings by the BJP-led government. Over the past month, journalists and farmers in India critical of the government have been arrested and even tortured by police, and more have been served with arrest warrants. Conservative and pro-corporate lobbying groups in the country have also attempted to bribe media outlets in order to remove any traces of critical reporting.
RY-JM and the YCL-LJC stand in solidarity with NewsClick and join the calls by other progressive media outlets, the Democratic Youth Federation of India, and the Students’ Federation of India in calling for an end to these anti-democratic attacks on India’s progressive workers and journalists. The cowardly tactics of the BJP-led government and their attempts to silence independent, progressive, and critically-minded voices only serve to show that prolonged and organized criticism is a threat to their reactionary and nationalistic policies. We condemn the continued arrests and raids on both NewsClick and other targets, and echo the call to support the voices of India’s left.
Banner photo by Aditi S., via People’s Dispatch