A top US official has praised India’s press freedom and the importance of journalists in promoting democracy in the world’s most populous country.
US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Donald Lu stated that “there is nothing that’s kept secret there. You have India as a democracy in part because you have a free press that really works.”
“I know the media market is changing. But I have such respect for the freedom of the press in India. There is nothing that’s kept secret there. You have India as a democracy in part because you have a free press that really works,” Lu told PTI in Washington.
“I can remember going into MEA (Ministry of External Affairs) once and seeing a senior person with files stacked up to the ceiling because he was processing a Right For Information request. And he was complaining bitterly about having to do this and I could only laugh because we have to do the same thing in our bureaucracy where if someone asks for a document, I have to spend several days finding the document for them because that’s what democracy does,” he said.
According to the Press Freedom Index report issued by Reporters without borders last in 2022, India stood at 150 in a list comprising of 180 countries.
