When authorities raided the Jammu office of Kashmir Times today , seizing documents and sealing premises, it marked not an isolated incident but the culmination of a systematic campaign to extinguish one of the region’s last independent voices. For decades, this publication had chronicled life across the Line of Control with unflinching honesty. Its targeting reveals a broader strategy: the transformation of journalism from watchdog to state stenographer in one of the world’s most militarized zone Indian occupied Kashmir.
A Legacy of Independent Witness
Founded in 1954 by Ved Bhasin, Kashmir Times emerged as a rare platform that amplified Kashmiri aspirations while navigating the treacherous terrain between separatist sentiment and Indian state narratives. Bhasin, a towering figure in regional journalism, built the paper on principles of factual reporting and moral clarity, giving space to voices ignored by mainstream Indian media. After his death in 2015, his daughter Anuradha Bhasin inherited not just a publication but a mission—one she pursued with renewed vigor even as the ground shifted beneath her feet. Under her editorship, the paper continued documenting human rights abuses, civilian casualties, and the psychological toll of perpetual conflict, earning both reader loyalty and official anger.
The Slow Strangulation Before 2019
The assault on press freedom in Kashmir did not begin with a single decree but through incremental asphyxiation. Prior to 2019, journalists operated in a climate of managed intimidation: surveillance, informal “advice” from security officials, and the threat of being labeled “anti-national.” The state employed softer weapons—denial of government advertisements, veiled threats to families, and the cultivation of a compliant media elite who traded access for silence. Self-censorship became survival. Kashmir Times navigated this minefield by maintaining meticulous sourcing and refusing to bend its editorial line, but the space for such independence was visibly shrinking. Internet shutdowns, already routine, disrupted reporting cycles. The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) loomed as a potential weapon, though it had not yet been fully deployed against journalists.
The August 2019 Catastrophe
The abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A on August 5, 2019, severed not just constitutional provisions but the region’s information lifelines. A complete communications blackout—internet, mobile phones, landlines—descended, creating an information vacuum that lasted months. This became the longest internet shutdown ever imposed in a democracy. Journalists were reduced to filing stories from makeshift media centers with a single government-controlled internet connection, their reports subject to official screening.
The government of India then institutionalized censorship through the 2020 Media Policy, granting itself power to label reporting “fake news” and deny state advertising to dissenting outlets. It effectively criminalized journalism by conflating reporting on militancy with supporting militancy. Anuradha Bhasin challenged the communications blackout in the Supreme Court, resulting in the Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India judgment that declared indefinite internet shutdowns illegal. Yet the victory proved pyrrhic; the court allowed “reasonable restrictions” that authorities exploited to maintain near-total control.
The Systematic Destruction of Kashmir Times
Post-2019, Kashmir Times became a primary target. Its Srinagar office was forcibly closed in 2020 after authorities pressured the landlord to terminate the lease. The Jammu office faced multiple raids under flimsy pretexts. Multiple FIRs were registered against Anuradha Bhasin—one for “inciting disaffection” after she published a factually accurate report on a protest, another for violating opaque “media guidelines.” The message was clear: even legal victories would not protect you.
Bhasin’s 2023 book, Dismantled State: The Untold Story of Kashmir’s Article 370 Abrogation, provided comprehensive documentation of the constitutional coup and its human cost. The government response was swift—new cases, intensified harassment, and the eventual sealing of her Jammu office. Giving platform to diverse Kashmiri viewpoints, including those critical of Indian policy, was recast as a criminal act. The raids were not investigations but punishments, designed to bankrupt the institution and isolate its editor.
The Wider War on Journalists
Kashmir Times was not alone. The region witnessed an unprecedented crackdown on journalistic work. Fahad Shah, editor of The Kashmir Walla, was arrested in February 2022 under UAPA for “glorifying terrorism” after reporting a gunfight. His colleague Sajad Gul, arrested in January 2022, remains incarcerated. Irfan Mehraj, another Kashmir Walla journalist, was detained in March 2023. Asif Sultan, who reported on militant recruitment, spent four years in jail before release. Photojournalist Masrat Zahra was charged under UAPA for social media posts, while journalist Gowhar Geelani faced travel bans and repeated interrogations.
In April 2022, the state orchestrated a hostile takeover of the Srinagar Press Club, a historic hub of journalistic solidarity. A government-backed faction seized control, evicting elected members and converting the institution into a propaganda platform. The club’s new leadership immediately barred critical journalists, completing the physical and symbolic destruction of independent journalism’s infrastructure.
Criminalizing Truth-Telling
The criminalization extends beyond individual journalists to the very act of documentation. Human rights activists face UAPA charges for recording civilian deaths. Reporting on army excesses invites sedition investigations. The government has created a binary: either you are a “patriotic” journalist amplifying official narratives about “normalcy” and “development,” or you are a “militant sympathizer” deserving imprisonment. This has cultivated an environment where documenting reality becomes an act of sedition.
Manufacturing the Only Acceptable Narrative
This systematic suppression serves a singular purpose: narrative control. With local journalism neutered, the government floods the information space with its version—Kashmir as a success story of integration, militancy defeated, prosperity blooming. Critical reporting that might reveal ongoing human rights violations, psychological trauma, or political disenfranchisement is eliminated. The international community receives sanitized information, while Kashmiris themselves are denied the vocabulary to articulate their experiences. The press, once a bridge between the region and the world, has become a one-way loudspeaker for state power.
Conclusion: A Press Under Siege Is Democracy Under Siege
The targeting of Kashmir Times and Anuradha Bhasin represents more than personal vendettas; it is the attempted erasure of a historical record and the intimidation of future chroniclers. Bhasin’s perseverance—continuing to publish, writing her book, challenging power legally—embodies journalism’s defiant spirit. But individual courage cannot substitute for institutional protection.
The international community must recognize that press freedom in Kashmir is not a peripheral concern but the central battleground for democratic values. When journalists are jailed for facts and publications shuttered for dissent, the world loses its window into one of its most volatile conflicts. Solidarity with Kashmir Times is solidarity with the principle that no democracy can survive without witnesses willing to speak uncomfortable truths. The raids will continue, the cases will multiply, but as long as editors like Anuradha Bhasin persist, the story of Kashmir—complex, contested, and human—cannot be fully silenced.
