 For more videos on people's struggles, please subscribe to our YouTube channel. The 5th of September 2019 was the second anniversary of the assassination of Gauri Lankesh, a journalist from the state of Karnataka in India, who was a harsh critic of the ruling far right-wing dispensation in the country. A leftist activist and editor of the Gauri Lankesh Patrikke, a weekly newspaper published in Karnataka, Gauri was known for consistently speaking truth to power. She was assassinated by right-wing thugs at her residence in the city of Bangalore. An ongoing probe by a special investigation team has given out clear indications that the murder was politically motivated. Gauri's assassination is part of a pattern. The people who have been arrested in this case were also found to have links with those responsible for the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar in 2013, progressive scholar M. M. Kalburgi in 2015 and communist leader Govind Pansare also in 2015. The three were activists who spoke up against religious politics and obscurantism and stood for secularism and scientific term. Gauri's assassination is also part of a larger trend of attacks against journalists which have soared since the far right government of Narendra Modi came to power in 2014. Progressive and even liberal journalists have been hounded on social media by right-wing mobs with some of the perpetrators followed by the prime minister himself. But this is merely the tip of the iceberg. Recently, Pawan Jayaswal, a journalist with Jan Sandesh, a Hindi news reporter, was arrested and booked for criminal conspiracy. What was his crime? Jayaswal did a video report on the implementation of the crucial midday meal scheme in the state of Uttar Pradesh which is ruled by the Hindu monk Adityanath who also belongs to Modi's party, the BJP. The midday meal scheme provides food once a day for school-going children in government and government finance schools. The meal is expected to provide 450 calories per day to the children and is a crucial component in ensuring school attendance remains high, especially in rural areas. In his report, Jayaswal shows a video of kids in a government school in Mirzapur in the state being forced to eat rotis which is round flatbread with salt which needless to say is much less than what they're supposed to be provided. The headmaster in charge of the school was suspended following Jayaswal's report. However, when the video began making the rounds, Jayaswal was charged with criminal conspiracy. He was booked with obstructing a public servant during the discharge of their duty, providing false evidence and cheating. The editor's guild of India condemned the incident and stated that this was a cruel and classic case of shooting the messenger. They also urged the government to withdraw the cases and stop harassing him. A protest was organized by fellow journalists condemning the arrest of their colleague. In June, another journalist Prashant Kanojia, again from Uttar Pradesh, was arrested by the government and put behind bars for retweeting a video in which a woman professed her love for the Chief Minister Adityanath. The video made it clear that she was speaking to a number of TV channels as there were microphones in front of her. However, Kanojia who retweeted this video was arrested for making defamatory comments with an attempt, according to the police, to malign the image of the Chief Minister. It is important to note here that no one had filed a complaint and the police registered the case so motive. Once again, journalists staged protests in defence of their colleague and Kanojia was finally released on bail by the Supreme Court, which noted that while he did not appreciate his tweets, he could not be put behind bars for them. The most direct and emblematic case of suppression of freedom of expression is in Kashmir. On August 5th, the whole state of Jammu and Kashmir was shut down, even as its constitutionally guaranteed autonomy was revoked and it was bifurcated. Of course, all this took place without any consultation with the people or their elected representatives. The communications shutdown imposed by the Indian government meant that not only did many people in Kashmir not have access to information on what was being done to them, but also that their protests went unreported. While the communications shutdown has been slightly relaxed, journalists who refuse to take a pro-government stance are being continuously repressed. On August 31st, Gohar Ghilani, a Kashmiri journalist, was prevented from going to Germany for an 8-day journalism training program. He had released a book in July called Kashmir, Rage and Reason, which talks about the struggles of Kashmiris and their resistance. This is again part of a trend. In the aftermath of the Indian government's decision, journalists complained that security forces were forcefully deleting the videos they had recorded. The Kashmir Press Club, in a statement on September 2, expressed serious concerns over the communication blockade in Kashmir and the use of harassment as a means to coerce journalists to toe a particular line. Three senior Kashmiri journalists, Eja Suzein, Fayaz Bukhari and Naseer Masoodi, were asked by the government to vacate their accommodations as soon as possible. The level of harassment is quite explicit in this case. The Narendra Modi government and its right-wing affiliates have been on a clampdown spree. Journalists, academics, activists, students and organised workers are bearing the brunt of this. However, the resistance by these sections is also on the rise, proving that the right-wing will never succeed in suppressing the voices to people and the spirit of struggle.