BBC offices in India raided amid controversy over documentary critical of Modi

The ace Indian tax authorities recorded on Tuesday BBC offices in New Delhi and Mumbai, weeks after the network aired a documentary about Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s performance during deadly sectarian riots in 2002.

A spokesperson for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accused the station of doing “anti indian propagandabut assured the raids were legal and the timing had nothing to do with the government.

“India is a country that provides opportunities for all organizations,” Gaurav Bhatia told reporters, “as long as you don’t spit poison.” “If you followed the law of the land, if you have nothing to hide, why fear lawful action?”

In a statement on Twitter, the network said it was “fully cooperating” with authorities. “We hope that this situation will be resolved as soon as possible,” they added.

Police cordoned off the BBC office in New Delhi, which occupies two floors of a skyscraper on a leafy avenue in the commercial heart of the capital. A BBC employee in New Delhi said officers they had “seized all the phones” during the raid.

Last month the BBC broadcast a Two-part documentary alleging Hindu nationalist Modi ordered police to turn a blind eye to sectarian riots in the state of Gujarat, where he was then Prime Minister.

The violence ended with at least 1,000 deadmost of them Muslims belonging to minorities.

He The Indian government has blocked videos and tweets containing links to the documentarywhich has not been issued in the country, making use of emergency powers granted by information technology laws.

Government adviser Kanchan Gupta called the documentary “hostile propaganda and anti-Indian nonsense”.

Later, university student groups staged screenings of the documentary despite campus bans, defying government efforts to stop its broadcast. Police arrested two dozen students at the prestigious Delhi University after preventing a screening in late January.

“It was the BBC documentary first that was banned,” the opposition Congress party said on Twitter. “Now the IT has raided the BBC,” he continued, referring to the income tax department. “Undeclared emergency”.

Press freedom in the world’s largest democracy has suffered under Modi, say rights activists and opposition lawmakers. The opposition Congress party condemned the raids, saying there was an “undeclared emergency” in the country.

India has fallen 10 places to 150 out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Indexproduced by Reporters Without Borders, since Modi took office in 2014.

Critical reporters, especially women, say they are subjected to relentless campaigns of internet abuse.

The media, international human rights groups and foreign charities have also come under scrutiny from Indian tax authorities and financial crime investigators.

Last year, the charity of the late Catholic nun Mother Teresa found itself temporarily without funds after the Home Office refused to renew its license to receive foreign donations.

Amnesty International has announced it is suspending its operations in India after the government froze its bank accounts in 2020, following searches of its offices.

In 2021, Indian tax authorities raided a leading newspaper and TV station that had criticized the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, prompting allegations of intimidation.

The 2002 riots in Gujarat began after 59 Hindu pilgrims were killed in a train fire. Thirty-one Muslims were convicted of criminal conspiracy and murder for the incident.

The BBC documentary cited a previously classified UK Foreign Office report in which Anonymous sources claimed that Modi met with senior police officials and “ordered them not to intervene” in the anti-Muslim violence. right-wing Hindu groups that followed.

The violence was “politically motivated” and the purpose “was to purge Muslims from Hindu areas”, according to the Foreign Office report.

The “systematic campaign of violence has all the hallmarks of ethnic cleansing” and was impossible “without the climate of impunity created by the state government…Narendra Modi is directly responsible”, he concluded.

Modi, who ruled Gujarat from 2001 until his election as prime minister in 2014, was briefly subject to a travel ban to the United States due to the violence.

In 2012, a special investigative team appointed by the Supreme Court of India to investigate the role of Modi and others in the violence said it had found no evidence to prosecute him.

(With AFP information/by Uzair Rizvi)

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