Is “Survey” On BBC A Self-Act Of The Current Government To Step On The Axe—A Story Of Valentine’s Day “Surveys”!

BBC raid, aka BBC Survey-Is it necessary or just a threat to shut the international journalism, as done in the case of Indian media?

Already the world is glueing its eyes on the regulatory system of Indian financial bodies about their proceedings in the Adani- Hindenburg case; in such a moment raiding BBC will be a justified step for the current government or it has welcomed an invisible enemy to its doors!

BBC is not only the mechanism that got a harsh move by the government on asking genuine questions; there are others on this list as well. But will these “surveys” create a negative impact on the Indian territory on the global platform? Will these have a negative consequence on the global investments and talent pool from outside lands? After all these ‘surveys’, can we open and be broad-chested call ourselves the ‘Mother of Democracy’?

Isn’t this strange that the regulatory bodies are doing ‘surveys’ on mere taxation doubts on the foreign broadcaster in such a situation when the Adani group is facing the loss of rupees which is the hard-earned money of the common man??

Isn’t that surprising that when government should put efforts into investigating such Adani losses and save Indian money from further going down, the regulatory bodies (as directed by the central government) are just trying to degrade a media channel, showcasing the childish act of taking revenge?

The tale of Valentine’s Day ‘Survey’!

Wait, the great central government and the respected government-favouring media houses asserted that these are not raids; they are just mere ‘surveys’- an action against the received information. But in which ‘surveys’, the phones and computers of employees are taken away, or they are asked to stay the night for long hours? Surveys can only be done during office hours or business hours, then why do BBC ‘surveys’ continue during the night hours? Ahh! The officials were so busy that they couldn’t figure out the differences between day and night, such a ‘dedicated and desperate’ effort to recollect the tax from the foreign channel!!

The people of right-wing, the ones supporting the present governance, ‘argued’ that the BBC documentary (which is an obvious preceding cause of BBC ‘surveys’) was an act of ‘colonial mindset’; they claimed that the white ones do not want the brown ones to grow….; but this is not seen when our honorable PM visits the white ones on his international tours, with the propaganda of spreading Indian magnificence o the global platform (and getting great businesses for his buddies)? If this white-brown concept of Racism doesn’t come on international tours, while greeting global leaders, then why such a notion is being introduced in this case?

Moving on in the same lane, the right-wing supporters argue that the BBC documentary (which is an apparent trigger of BBC ‘surveys’) is launched at the time when India was fastening its belts to hold the command of the G20 presidency or the documentary came at a time when there are free trade agreements taking place between India and UK, and hence these efforts, like the ancient one, are planned to tarnish the image of growing India! 

But at the same time, using Emergency laws, banning BBC documentaries from all social media platforms and wherever possible, and then doing ‘surveys’ on BBC offices is not an effort to gag press freedom? Will this move is contributing to damaging the image of Indian Democracy on a global platform?

After all, the efforts to suppress the media from asking questions on behalf of the common man and the government’s attitude towards media, will India still enjoy the Press Freedom Index Rank of 150 on a global platform? Guess what, it dropped from 142 to 150! India’s rank had seen a consistent fall in 2016 when it was ranked 133. Is that the current governance, after taking charge in 2014, trying every possible attempt to shut the voice of the media and ultimately shut the voice of the common man?

We are not saying that the BBC documentary is not propaganda against India. It can be. In a time when India is climbing the ladder of success and economical growth, certain agencies or groups may be targeting India to tarnish its image. But is the correct way to handle unwanted propaganda by ‘raiding’ BBC offices? Debates and Criticisms are parts of democracy, even though they are the two strongest pillars of democracy, which makes the concept of democracy even fairer and justified. But is banning the documentary planning raids on the media house which does not go in your opinion the right move?

As per the charging authority, BBC was ‘surveyed’ given the BBC’s “deliberate non-compliance with the transfer pricing rules. Now, what is transfer pricing? In layman’s terms, it is an act of ‘controlled transfer’ of funds, goods, and services from one internal company to another. In common, these kinds of acts are done by those companies who want to show their balance sheets in profit or want to evade tax. BBC is a publicly funded organization, so why is it may involve in such kind of activities? Does this again create pressure on central governance that whether their move to conduct BBC’s survey was justified or not?

BBC has not only created a documentary on Indian PM only; it has a track record of publishing extremely hard documentaries on other nations and their heads as well. So it is not new for BBC to create a documentary of the Indian PM. But the way the Indian PM reacted to it sounds controversial!

If BBC is the only case, then we might understand that the BBC documentary was ‘an intended target’ on India, but there are several other sources that do not praise India so much as it proclaims itself to be! International platforms like The Washington Post, The Guardian, The New York Times, and The TIME magazine all are writing ‘not so good’ about Indian land. Are all these media organizations running a targeted attack on India, or is this a signal that the Indian government does not want to listen to those who do not comply with their opinion?

Disclosure.

Nowadays, there are consistent raids every other day in the entire nation. Moreover, the outcome of these raids is also not productive as they are expected to be. Furthermore, BBC is in the habit of making harsh documentaries; this behavior of BBC is what, we guess, is missed by the present governance. Maybe, they forgot to think that the people who made BBC documentaries are the ones sitting at their London headquarters and are unaffected by these ‘surveys’ on their Indian offices; and in retaliation or in parallel with their habit of making harsh documentaries, they may make even more complex documentaries which may target and disclose even further sins of many on the government!

The problem is not about the documentary; the major cause of concern is the way it is handled. If the documentary would have come and gone, this would not have created much chaos as it is now! The BBC documentary may be an act of ‘targeted propaganda’, but banning it by using the emergency powers and creating ‘surveys’ on the concerned body, is not an attribute of Democracy!