How Chhattisgarh May Be Using Its War On Maoists To Snoop On Journalists

Raipur: In Chhattisgarh, as controversy mounts over the arrests of two journalists in the past three weeks, the focus has turned to the first set of journalists arrested by the police, going back to a year ago.

Somaru Nag and Santosh Yadav, two Bastar-based reporters, were arrested on in two separate cases, charged with assisting Maoists. Mr Nag has been booked for keeping watch while alleged Maoists burnt down a crusher plant. Mr Yadav has been booked for being present when a group of Maoists attacked a police patrol, killing a Special Task force personnel. He's been charged under the draconian Chhattisgarh Public Safety Act which can keep him in jail for up to five years.  

The evidence against these journalists however has always been in doubt, sparking protests last year.

But now the District Collector of Bastar Amit Kataria told NDTV that both reporters were under surveillance, and that call transcripts contained clinching evidence of conversations between them and Maoists.

The admission by the Collector only confirms what has been known all along that the state has been snooping on a wide range of actors under the rubric of the war against Maoists.

Phone taps require clearance of the State Home Department. Officials insisted that they follow guidelines in sanctioning taps, but refused to confirm if they have done so in the case of Mr Nag and Mr Yadav.

Bafflingly, when NDTV studied the chargesheets filed against both Mr Nag and Mr Yadav, we found no reference to call transcripts. In the case of Mr Yadav, the police has attached Call Data Records (CDR) which shows records of calls between certain numbers, not what was said.

In conflict zones, it is commonplace for reporters to talk to all sides, including insurgents. Mr Kataria however insists that the phone conversations overheard by the police relate to the reporters assisting Maoists, and were not of journalistic nature.

He had no explanation, however, for why the purported conversations did not form part of the chargesheet.

In both cases, testimonies of witnesses who claim to have seen Mr Nag and Mr Yadav on the spot is attached as the main evidence. Some of those witnesses in the case of Nag have retracted, claiming they were coerced into implicating the reporter in court.

The journalists' families claim they were being harassed because they helped local tribals if they were picked up by the police on wrongful charges.

This raises disturbing questions, as to whether its fight against Maoist insurgency has become an excuse for the state to encroach on civil liberties and silence dissent.