“Certainly, the future is not going to be easy. Perhaps things would become far worse before it becomes better.”

Srinagar: When the government clamped down on Kashmir, last year, and snapped all lines of communication for weeks – the media fraternity was isolated. The idea of press freedom couldn’t get grimmer, everyone thought. Then came 2020; as the scare of pandemic sweeps the world, the government hardened the crackdown on journalists in the Valley.

In March 2020, the government booked two journalists under the country’s anti-terror law: Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). Another FIR was filed against a report from Shopian, south Kashmir, published in The Hindu. A long list of summons by the government forces and agencies – asking journalists to explain their stories – often goes unreported. So does the physical harassment of journalists by the government forces.

https://thekashmirwalla.com/2020/05/world-press-freedom-future-of-news-kashmir/