Whenever Nepal’s autocrats wanted to warn the media during the absolute monarchy days, they arrested a few journalists on a Friday.
That is what the state apparatus did on 30 October, leading to muted protests over the weekend. Plainclothes police officers entered newsrooms to nab reporters following a story about state highhandedness.
In the past, authoritarian regimes wanted everyone to know they were behind the detention, but Prime Minister Balendra Shah’s office denied any involvement, insinuating that Nepal Police chief Inspector General Dan Bahadur Karki was miffed about media coverage regarding efforts to sack him.
But then on Friday night, the Police said it had been acting on the advisers’ orders. For journalists covering their colleagues’ detention, this was an impossible to verify case of he-said-she-said.
Even so, it was yet another indication that relations between the governing party and the government are not well. Worse, it could even be a worrying rift between the government and the security apparatus.
Plainclothes police officers made rounds of several media outlets across Kathmandu to question and detain journalists on Friday in a move that was widely condemned by the mediasphere, civil society, political leadership, and press freedom watchdogs.
Security officials took DNA Khabar editor-in-chief Dhiraj Basnet, Motive News editor Shobhraj Baral, and Nepal Press reporter Bishwamani Subedi into custody on Friday afternoon.
Subedi was said to have been detained on the basis of a letter from the Cyber Bureau after Nepal Press published news claiming that the government was considering relieving Inspector General Karki from his duties. Nepal Press newsroom leadership were questioned about their sources.
Basnet was called in by the Kathmandu Valley Crime Investigation Office under the pretext of discussing an eSewa account number. Baral was similarly taken in without charges on vague grounds.
Officers also entered the Naya Patrika newsroom in an attempt to find journalist Nawaraj Mainali, who reported on the leaked WhatsApp coversation between a power broker and a Supreme Court justice.
Another police team went to Anamnagar to Diyo Post’s office looking for editor-in-chief Sudeep Bishwakarma and news coordinator Madan Dhungana, but left after failing to find them.
When pressed by journalists on the charge and documentation, police refused to provide them saying they were just acting on ‘orders from above’.
Naya Patrika broke the story earlier this week involving leaked correspondence between Supreme Court Justice Hari Phuyal and political fixer Imam Sapkota insinuating political interference in judicial proceedings. Other media outlets followed up on the piece, with coverage of corruption and collusion between judicial officials, political and security officials, as well as middlemen.
Detained journalists were released after a few hours, reinforcing the theory that this was to send a warning to the rest of the media not to step out of lione.
It is most likely that the PMO ordered the detentions despite denials by the prime minister’s advisers. But it was condemned by figures across the political spectrum, most tellingly by leaders of the governing RSP itself. Spokesperson Jagdish Kharel, himself a former tv anchor, said the arrests violated press freedom and freedom of expression.
Many including in the press drew comparisons to the crackdowns on the press during Gyanendra’s rule after he staged a military-backed coup on 1 February 2005 when he sent the army into newsrooms to censor content, and detain pro-democracy journalists.
In a statement, the Federation of Nepalese Journalists called the detention of reporters by polics a blatant interference with press freedom’: ‘It is entirely inappropriate to resort to state terror if there are any grievances about news content instead of seeking resolution through established legal procedures. These actions violate the Constitution, domestic laws, and international legal standards.’
This is not the first time intimidation tactics against the press have been employed since the RSP government took office. In July, there was a coordinated blockade of the main gates of some media companies by illegally parked cars as a symbolic protest against the media coverage of the government’s drives to curb traffic violations.
The RSP condemned the move then too, but social media accounts known to be associated with the Prime Minister’s chief adviser supported the action. Nepal rans highest in South Asia for press freedom, however trolling and threats against journalists by the prime minister’s supporters have led to a degree of self-censorship.
On Friday evening, Prime Minister Balendra Shah’s press adviser Deepa Dahal wrote on social media that the PM, his secretariat, and the PMO had no knowledge of the reporters’ detention, and that the PM had immediately instructed relevant authorities to release the detained journalists and refrain from newsroom crackdowns.
The reporters were released on Friday evening, and the Nepal Police also issued a clarification saying that the journalists were not detained, but brought in for ‘routine questioning’ on orders from the prime minister’s office.
The denial of responsibility by the PMO and the security apparatus points to a disconnect, at least in public, between the two state institutions, at a time when the judicial arm of the state has also been dragged into the mud.
This seems to be an attempt at plausible deniability and finger pointing by the PMO and Police, and hints at a widening rift between Prime Minister Shah and The RSP Chair Rabiu Lamichhane.
