There is an old question that every democracy must answer: Who watches the government?
The obvious answer is the media.
But in India, the question has become slightly more complicated.
Who watches the media when the media is busy watching the government watching the media?
Confused? You should be.
Because the relationship between the Indian news media and the government has always been something of a complicated marriage. There have been periods of love, periods of conflict, periods of silent treatment and, occasionally, periods when one partner has simply locked the other in a room and confiscated the telephone.
Since Independence, every Indian government has publicly professed its commitment to a free press. And, to be fair, most governments have tolerated criticism to varying degrees.
But governments, like human beings, have a fascinating relationship with criticism.
They believe passionately in freedom of expression, especially when someone else is expressing agreement.
The moment criticism begins, freedom of expression suddenly develops certain complications. National interest enters the room. Public order arrives shortly afterwards. Security concerns are summoned. Someone discovers an obscure regulation. And before you know it, the critic is being asked a question that has become increasingly fashionable in democracies everywhere:
“Why are you saying this now?”
Well, perhaps because journalism is supposed to say things.
That brings us to the long and complicated story of the Indian media and political power.
The Microphone Belonged to the Government
When India became independent in 1947, it inherited not only the institutions of British India but also many of its habits of administration.
The press had a proud history. Newspapers had played an important role in the freedom movement. Editors had gone to prison. Publications had been banned. Journalism, at least in its idealised memory, had fought authority.
But broadcasting was a different matter.
All India Radio was under government control. And for decades, that was perfectly normal in the Indian system.
Radio was not merely entertainment. In a vast country with low literacy and enormous linguistic diversity, it was a powerful instrument of communication. It could educate. It could inform. It could promote national integration.
And, of course, it could tell the nation what the government thought was important.
Now, none of this was necessarily sinister. A newly independent country needed communication infrastructure. The government had legitimate developmental objectives.
But there is a fundamental problem when the government owns the loudest microphone in the country.
Sooner or later, the microphone begins to sound suspiciously like the person holding it.
For decades, private radio was effectively kept away from news broadcasting. Even when private FM radio eventually arrived, entertainment was welcome. Music was welcome. Cheerful banter was welcome.
But news?
Ah, news was a more serious matter.
Apparently, a country could survive a thousand radio stations playing film songs, but allowing too many independent voices to tell listeners what was happening was a risk best approached with caution.
This was the essential contradiction of Indian broadcasting. The airwaves belonged to the public in theory, but for much of independent India's history, the government had a remarkably strong claim on the keys to the studio.
Newspapers Had Freedom. With an Asterisk.
The print media enjoyed considerably greater freedom.
The Constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a), and the courts recognised that freedom of the press flowed from this constitutional guarantee.
But there was one important detail.
Freedom was not absolute.
There were reasonable restrictions. There were laws. There were regulations. There were security concerns.
And there was always the government.
Governments could not simply dictate every newspaper headline in normal times. But they possessed other forms of influence. Licensing and regulatory powers mattered. Government advertising mattered. Legal action mattered.
A newspaper might be constitutionally free to criticise the government.
The more practical question was whether the newspaper could afford to do so indefinitely.
This does not mean that the Indian press was a collection of frightened institutions. Far from it. Indian newspapers produced some of the finest and most fearless journalism in the country.
But freedom of the press has always existed alongside a rather uncomfortable reality:
The state does not have to own a newspaper to influence its environment.
And then, in 1975, the government decided that influencing the environment was simply too time-consuming.
It was much easier to control the weather.
The Emergency: When Democracy Put Journalism on Mute
The Emergency of 1975 to 1977 remains the darkest chapter in the history of independent Indian journalism.
On the night of 25 June 1975, democracy did not disappear with a dramatic explosion.
It was more bureaucratic than that.
The lights went out at newspaper offices. Censorship orders arrived. Editors discovered that publishing the news had become a government-approved activity.
The Press Council was abolished.
Major news agencies were merged into Samachar.
Journalists were detained.
Pre-censorship became a reality.
And the government-controlled broadcasters, All India Radio and Doordarshan, became instruments through which the official version of India could be delivered directly to Indian homes.
The popular nickname for AIR during that period was “All Indira Radio.”
It was a cruel joke.
But like many cruel jokes, it survived because it contained a recognisable truth.
The Emergency demonstrated something every democracy should remember: freedom can disappear much faster than institutions expect.
A newspaper that had spent decades fighting colonial rule could discover overnight that its greatest challenge was no longer finding a good story.
It was getting permission to print one.
To its credit, sections of the Indian press resisted. *The Indian Express* and *The Statesman*, among others, became associated with acts of defiance against censorship.
But the Emergency also exposed another uncomfortable truth.
Not everyone needs to be forced into submission.
Some people volunteer.
And that is perhaps the most important lesson of the Emergency. Censorship is not always imposed with a policeman standing in the newsroom.
Sometimes an editor looks at the political atmosphere, looks at the commercial interests of the organisation, looks at the possible consequences and decides that courage is an unnecessary luxury.
Democracy Returned. Dependence Did Not Disappear.
When the Emergency ended in 1977, formal censorship was lifted and the press regained its freedom.
India had survived a profound democratic crisis.
But surviving a crisis does not automatically solve the structural problems that created the vulnerability.
The question of autonomous broadcasting returned. Committees had already recommended that public broadcasting should be independent of the government.
The idea was straightforward.
A public broadcaster should belong to the public.
This should not have been a revolutionary concept.
Unfortunately, in India, separating a government institution from government influence has often been rather like separating milk from tea after you have stirred it.
The Prasar Bharati Act was passed in 1990, but the corporation became operational only in 1997.
Even then, the larger question remained unresolved.
Can a broadcaster truly be editorially independent if its institutional structure, funding and important appointments remain closely connected to the state?
The answer is not always simple.
Public broadcasting does not have to become anti-government broadcasting in order to be independent. Nor should it.
A public broadcaster has every right to report government achievements.
The problem begins when government achievements become the only achievements worth reporting.
Then Came Liberalisation and the Great Indian Noise Machine
The 1990s changed everything.
Economic liberalisation and satellite television broke the old broadcasting monopoly.
Suddenly, Doordarshan was no longer the only window through which millions of Indians saw the world.
Private channels arrived.
Cable television exploded.
CNN's coverage of the Gulf War demonstrated that news could travel across borders and enter living rooms without asking the Indian government for permission.
And then came the great Indian television revolution.
Zee.
Star.
And eventually a multitude of 24-hour news channels.
For the first time, political leaders faced a media environment they did not directly control.
This was unquestionably a democratic advance.
But India soon discovered that freedom from a government monopoly did not automatically produce perfect journalism.
It produced competition.
And competition produced something else.
Ratings.
The viewer became king.
And the advertiser became the king's financial adviser.
The result was a new kind of pressure.
The government was no longer the only powerful institution capable of influencing news.
Corporations entered the picture. Large media conglomerates expanded. Political interests developed media connections.
And television discovered that outrage was excellent for business.
A complicated policy debate could be boring.
But six people shouting simultaneously about whether the nation was in danger?
That was prime-time entertainment.
From Censorship to the More Sophisticated Art of Influence
This brings us to the India of today.
Is the Indian media free?
The honest answer is: yes, but the word “free” requires several footnotes.
India has thousands of publications, television channels and digital platforms. Journalists investigate governments. Newspapers publish criticism. Opposition leaders appear on television. Social media produces more political commentary before breakfast than an entire generation could have imagined in 1947.
So it would be historically inaccurate to claim that India is living through a permanent Emergency.
But it would be equally naïve to pretend that political power has lost its interest in influencing the media.
Governments have many tools.
Advertising.
Regulation.
Investigations.
Legal action.
Access.
Licensing.
And, perhaps most importantly, the ability to create an atmosphere in which certain kinds of journalism become expensive, difficult or inconvenient.
This is the great difference between old-fashioned censorship and modern influence.
The old censor put a red line through your article.
The modern system may simply make you wonder whether writing the article is worth the trouble.
That is far more subtle.
And subtlety has one great advantage.
Nobody has to admit that censorship exists.
But Let Us Not Pretend the Media Is Always the Victim
There is another side to this story, and the media must not escape scrutiny merely because governments are powerful.
Not every editorial decision is made under political pressure.
Sometimes it is made because sensationalism sells.
Sometimes because ideology is good for ratings.
Sometimes because owners have political preferences.
And sometimes because shouting is easier than reporting.
A journalist can be silenced by the government.
But journalism can also be weakened by the journalist's own institution.
A television channel that spends every evening conducting political gladiator contests may be completely free from government censorship.
That does not necessarily mean it is performing a public service.
A newspaper can criticise one political party with remarkable courage while treating another with extraordinary tenderness.
That is not always independence.
Sometimes it is simply partisanship wearing a press card.
The greatest danger to journalism is not merely that the government might control it.
The greater danger is that journalism might become so politically polarised that it stops recognising independence as an objective.
So, Who Is Holding Whom Accountable?
This is where we return to our original question.
Who watches the government?
The media.
Who watches the media?
The public, competing media institutions, independent journalism and, ideally, professional ethics.
But there is one principle that must remain non-negotiable.
The government of the day cannot be the ultimate editor of the national conversation.
A government deserves fair reporting.
It deserves credit when it succeeds.
It deserves the opportunity to explain its policies.
But it does not deserve immunity from criticism.
And the media has an equally important responsibility.
It must not become the permanent opposition merely because opposition is fashionable.
Nor should it become the permanent public relations department of whoever happens to occupy the government offices.
The media's job is not to love the government.
The media's job is not to hate the government.
The media's job is to ask questions.
Including the questions that nobody in power particularly wants to answer.
The Final Word
India has travelled a remarkable distance since 1947.
We moved from a government monopoly over broadcasting to hundreds of television channels and an enormous digital universe.
We survived the Emergency, the most direct assault on press freedom in our democratic history.
We liberalised broadcasting.
We created new institutions.
We opened the airwaves.
But the struggle for a genuinely independent media is not over.
It may never be over.
Because every generation discovers its own version of the same old temptation.
Those in power want favourable coverage.
Those seeking power want sympathetic coverage.
Corporations want useful coverage.
Political parties want loyal coverage.
And journalists, inconveniently, are supposed to want the truth.
That is why a free media will always have an uneasy relationship with power.
And perhaps that is exactly how it should be.
A comfortable media is often a compromised media.
A comfortable government may simply be a government that is not being asked enough questions.
Democracy does not need a media that screams at every government.
It does not need a media that applauds every government either.
It needs something much more difficult to create.
A media that can praise without becoming a cheerleader.
A media that can criticise without becoming a political party.
And above all, a media that remembers one simple fact: The microphone does not belong to the government. It does not belong to the corporation. It does not belong to the political party. In a democracy, it ultimately belongs to the citizen.
And if the citizen cannot hear the truth because the government is speaking too loudly, the corporations are paying for the programme, and the television anchors are shouting over everyone else...
Then perhaps it is time for all of us to stop shouting.
And start listening.
Because the day a democracy no longer has the courage to ask questions is not the day journalism fails.
It is the day democracy begins to lose its voice.
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