Keeping journalism alive in Kashmir

For over five months now, hundreds of journalists in Kashmir have had to wait in long queues every day in a couple of cramped rooms in Srinagar to get a few minutes of access to the internet. Reporters, newspaper designers, freelance journalists, photojournalists, and video journalists have had to stand in lines at the Media Facilitation Centre – set up by the central government in the premises of the Department of Information and Public Relations – and rely on a dozen computers with internet access to file their stories, make pages, and communicate with their editors.

Enforcing such a complete dependence of the media on the state is part of the Delhi government's strategy after the imposition of an unprecedented internet ban in Jammu & Kashmir following the abrogation of Article 370 and the downgrading of former state into two federally governed union territories on 5 August 2019. Since then, irrespective of their organisations and experiences, journalists are forced to rely on this government-run 'facilitation' centre – the only place in Kashmir where journalists can briefly access the internet, which, despite a recent Supreme Court order for the review of the ban, remains inaccessible to people in Kashmir since the lockdown began.