New Delhi, Feb 15, 2023, IANS

New Delhi, Feb 15 (IANS): The Congress on Wednesday criticised the Centre for the Income Tax department raids on BBC offices, and alleged that due to its high-handedness the press freedom index has fallen to 150.

Addressing a press conference here, Pawan Khera, party's media department chairman said, "Infact, India has a dubious position of 150th in the Press Freedom Index. 135 journalists in India were arrested, interrogated, or detained from 2014 to 2020. (As per Free Speech Collective) 37 Journalists have been killed in India since 2014 as UNESCO observatory of killed journalists."

He said that the Indian media has been "repeatedly strangulated, muzzled and bulldozed by the Modi government just because some of them (and a very small minority of them) have refused to toe the line of the BJP".

"When Modi ji was dreaming of becoming the Prime Minister of this country, then he was a dedicated follower of the same BBC.

"When the Prime Minister gets an award then you boast about it using your PR machinery to the whole wide world! And if the same media outlets, if the same international media sets your "record" straight, then you unleash your arrogance of power

"The party which licked the soles of the British, the party whose ideological flag bearers acted as British informers, those who pleaded clemency to the British crown, whilst Indian people were on streets peacefully fighting them, - has now suddenly started speaking against the British? Why? Is it because the real truth of Modi ji's role in the Gujarat riots, known to every Indian, now stands exposed, yet another time!"