The income tax raids on the offices of the BBC India in New Delhi and Mumbai – politely called as ‘surveys’ – have not come as a surprise to those who know this government. The raids obviously have nothing to do with any suspected money deal involving the BBC. It is hard to imagine that a public broadcaster like it would indulge in any financial misdeeds – too in India – which would warrant the attention of the income tax sleuths.
When income tax officers raided news organisations recently (eg. NewsClick, Dainik Bhaskar) it was motivated primarily by the regime’s desire to punish them for their audacity to scrutinise the acts of this government and to critique it when necessary. The official claim being made that the IT department is investigating persistent ‘transfer pricing’ and misreporting of profits by the BBC has been rubbished by tax experts.
The supporters of this government know it well that this raid on the BBC is an act of revenge by the government for the documentary on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s relations with Muslims in India. The documentary was not only about the 2002 riots, it was about the journey of India from 2002 to 2023, and especially since 2014.
The Editors Guild of India has rightly condemned the raids as yet another assault on the freedom of the media. But this doesn’t perturb the government. It has enacted this spectacle to tell its people that no one, not even the BBC, should dare cross the line drawn by it. They will have to suffer for criticising the government.
The government agency’s raids show that revenge is what the constituents of the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party keep looking for and the leader never disappoints. So, when analysts think that these raids are a self goal of this government, they fail to understand the psychological game that it is playing with the people of India.
Also read: BBC ‘Survey’: Modi Government Is Behaving Exactly Like Indira Gandhi During the Emergency
Those shocked by the act say that only a foolish government can do it when India has taken the role of the chair of G20, when representatives of the G20 countries are in India for various events, and when the BBC operates in all these countries. The government has earned nothing but bad press for it, internationally.
#bbcindia के दफ्तर के अंदर IT विभाग के अफसर और कर्मी के बीच बहस।#ITraids #ITRaidOnBBC pic.twitter.com/nfTgd6XWoC
— Govind Pratap Singh | GPS (@govindprataps12) February 14, 2023
This government’s past record explains that international opinion has never been a worry for it. It has brazenly raided and closed Greenpeace India and Amnesty International India; suspended funding routes to Oxfam India and various other organisations which have a global influence. The disapproving murmur from some friendly foreign governments didn’t mean much. The government knows that the West, the so-called ‘free world’, would rather have an authoritarian majoritarian India on its side, the objective being to take care of the increasing influence of China.
The Modi government is confident of total inaction from the international community. We need not flip the pages of our history books to understand that it has always been like that. But there is something more in the latest action of this government.
Prime Minister Modi wants his supporters to believe that they – and India – are in a state of war. Amnesty, Oxfam, Greenpeace all are foreign elements attacking it. It is legitimate for them to be neutralised. Similarly, the BBC documentary is an assault on India, as is the Hindenburg report on the Adani group.
BJP voters would have loved a revenge act against Hindenburg Research but sadly it does not have any office or an allied entity in India.
The Modi government is constantly creating a constituency which would like to score victories in imaginary battles or wars. So, changing of the names of Allahabad or Mughalsarai or Mughal Garden is a revenge against the medieval Muslim rulers. The attacks on Muslims and Christians in various parts of the country is part of an ongoing war to show them their place, to make them bow their heads.
The humiliation of organisations or individuals with any real or imaginary foreign link is yet another victory. This is what is being fed to this constituency which is asked to pay for these attacks with its votes. The international community must, however, think about the monster it is nourishing. The violence that this government has unleashed on Muslims, Christians and its critics will not only harm India irreparably but will have serious repercussions for the entire region and the world.
Apoorvanand teaches at Delhi University.
