The so-called Babri Masjid in Ayodhya was unused for prayer by the Shia community for decades. When it was destroyed in 1992 by an out-of-control assembly of activists, an international uproar ensued.
Media in the US and Europe had almost entirely greeted with silence the forcible reduction of the Hindu minority in Pakistan from 38 per cent to less than 1 per cent since 1947, or the killings on an industrial scale of Hindus in Bangladesh since 1971.
They were in full cry after the collapse of the Babri Masjid, despite the fact that not a single member of the minority community lost his or her life during that incident.
Especially in the 1990s, both BBC and CNN competed with each other to label those as ‘freedom fighters’ who had just months ago committed genocide against the Pandit in Kashmir valley. What such media were championing was the freedom of extremist elements to kill innocent people.
To this day, the destruction of nearly 300 places of worship in Kashmir has gone not only unpunished but ignored by successive governments, with not a single individual even charge-sheeted for the offence.
Freedom is universal. Freedom is indivisible. Especially in an era when the Knowledge Industry needs to power the creation of a hundred and twenty million more jobs in India over the next five years, freedom of expression (FOE) is essential for economic and social development.
"What is striking in India is that so many ‘champions of free speech’ suddenly become deaf, dumb and blind whenever the rights of those with whom they disagree personally and politically are sought to be restricted."
There has been much criticism of the manner in which the UP police have dealt with media persons involved in disseminating online and on television the views of a lady about Chief Minister Adityanath.
Shri Adityanath, I personally feel, needs to reflect on the experience of another Chief Minister, Narendra Modi in Gujarat, who for more than a decade was subjected to the most vicious of trolling, yet emerged stronger politically with every such abuse.
But what is strange is the silence of those condemning the action of the UP police against media persons on the ruthless, the relentless, manner in which Bengal, Karnataka or Kerala police - to take a few examples - have used colonial laws to send nearly 200 media persons to jail
Nehru’s (First) Amendment has been used with alacrity in several states, & yet those claiming to champion freedom of expression ignore both this enactment as well as the manner in which those with whose political & policy views they agree are using this to suppress contrary views
A genuine champion of freedom of expression will fight for the right even of those with whose opinions they are in complete disagreement with. We must avoid the error of treating as separate entities those in sync with our views and those who hold contrary opinions.
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