Journalist Raghav Trivedi who was recently heckled and attacked by allegedly Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) supporters, during Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s election rally in Rae Bareli of Uttar Pradesh recounted his ordeal in an interview with The Quint, raising a crucial question about the rights of Muslim journalists in India.
Trivedi, who works for the digital outlet Molitics was covering the event on Sunday, May 12 when he became the target of a vicious attack fueled by religious bigotry and intolerance allegedly for questioning some women who had come to listen to the senior BJP leader.
In the interview, he said that he got terrified when the group of people heckled him and beat him after mistaking him for a Muslim shortly after Shah’s speech ended.
“When the speech ended some people shouted at me suddenly and started pushing and beating me, i got scared when I heard some of them shouting ‘Mullah hai, Desh Dhrohi hai’ (He is a Muslim, he is an anti-national) I tried to show them my identity card, which had Raghav Trivedi written on it, however, they mistook my long hair and bread for a Muslim identity and continued to beat me relentlessly,” Trivedi said.
The journalist went on to explain that while the attackers kept him beating while shouting “Mullah hai Mullah hai (he is Muslim ),” he became more terrified and believed he would be killed.
He said because of his outer appearance attackers judged him and identified him as a Muslim some among them were shouting Atankwadi hai, rally ko disturb karne aya hai (he is a terrorist and came to disturb the rally) and snatched the camera, “Even if I was a Muslim, then don’t Muslims have right to practice Journalism in India?” Trivedi continued.
However, Trivedi’s ordeal is not an isolated incident. According to a study by the Free Speech Collective, In 2020, 67 journalists were arrested and nearly 200 were physically attacked in India, especially women critical of the government, face fierce online trolling and threats, with some even reporting attempts to break into their homes.
According to recent reports of the 2024 World Press Freedom Index, India has ranked 159th out of 180 countries, falling behind neighbouring Pakistan which ranked 152nd, posing a threat to the the world’s largest democracy.
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