India press freedom decline
India press freedom decline in 2026 is no longer a matter of opinion — it is a matter of documented, verified, internationally published fact. India has dropped to 157th place out of 180 countries in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index, released by Reporters Without Borders, marking a decline of six places from its 151st rank in 2025. In 2024, it was ranked 159th. The direction of travel is unmistakable and has been consistent for nearly a decade. This article presents the data — the rankings, the arrests, the laws, the ownership structures, and the individual journalists whose lives have been altered by a media environment that one of the world’s most respected press freedom organisations has classified as being in a condition of “very serious” concern.
Reporters Without Borders said India remains in the “very serious” category, adding that “legal frameworks are increasingly being weaponized to silence newsrooms” even in democratic countries. “In India, judicial harassment of independent media is intensifying, driven by the growing use of criminal statutes — defamation and national security laws among them — directly targeting journalists,” the organization said.
The annual index evaluates press freedom globally based on the conditions in which journalists operate and the extent of media independence. This year’s findings paint an alarming global picture, with more than half of all countries falling into the “difficult” or “very serious” categories for press freedom. “In 25 years, the average score of all 180 countries and territories included in the ranking has never been so low,” the report noted.
India’s trajectory in this index tells its own story:
| Year | RSF Rank (out of 180) | Category |
|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 150 | Very Serious |
| 2023 | 161 | Very Serious |
| 2024 | 159 | Very Serious |
| 2025 | 151 | Very Serious |
| 2026 | 157 | Very Serious |
The government’s response to these rankings, every year without exception, is to call them propaganda and unscientific and driven by anti-India bias. The government has never explained which specific findings are wrong.
The India press freedom decline in 2026 is driven in large part by the use of existing laws — particularly the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) — against journalists and media workers.
Laws like the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and IT Rules 2021 are routinely weaponized against journalists. Over 25,000 online takedowns were enforced in 2023, and 200 or more legal cases were filed against journalists in that year alone.
The UAPA is a counter-terrorism law that allows for extended detention without bail, making it an especially powerful tool when used against journalists. Unlike ordinary criminal charges, UAPA accused individuals can be held for months — sometimes years — before trial, as bail is exceptionally difficult to secure.
From late April to July 2025 alone, at least 125 people were detained nationwide for posts classified as “anti-national,” “pro-Pakistan,” or critical of Operation Sindoor. In Assam, 94 arrests were recorded. Uttar Pradesh recorded at least 30 arrests across 18 districts for “pro-Pakistani” or anti-Operation Sindoor content. Press freedom watchdogs including Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists described the surge as a deliberate chilling of critical commentary.
Among the individual cases that have drawn international attention:
Irfan Mehraj, freelance journalist and editor-in-chief of the online outlet Wande Magazine, marked three years of pretrial detention on March 20, 2026 — held without conviction under charges that press freedom groups have described as politically motivated.
In February 2026, journalist Ravi Nair was sentenced to a year in prison. His alleged crime was social media posts critical of the Adani Group.
Ashoka University professor Ali Khan Mahmudabad was detained for social media comments questioning India’s military operation and highlighting communal tensions, securing interim bail only after Supreme Court intervention. Senior Kashmiri freelance journalist Hilal Mir was detained in a police raid at his residence in Srinagar, accused of being a “radical social media user” spreading “anti-national content.”
The CJI’s cockroach remarks did not land in a vacuum. India’s youth are already under enormous economic pressure in 2026 — from rising fuel costs to a weakening rupee. Just days before the controversy, PM Modi himself stood before the nation and made a stunning economic appeal. Modi asked every Indian to stop buying gold, avoid foreign trips, and work from home — a direct consequence of India’s forex reserves falling by $38 billion in just two months. When the Chief Justice calls the same struggling youth “cockroaches”, the anger that followed was not just about one word. It was the breaking point of a generation already pushed to its limit.
No examination of India press freedom decline in 2026 is complete without looking at who controls the outlets through which most Indians receive their news.
Reliance Industries group’s magnate Mukesh Ambani, a close friend of the Prime Minister, owns more than 70 media outlets that are followed by at least 800 million Indians. The NDTV channel’s acquisition at the end of 2022 by Gautam Adani, a tycoon who is also close to Modi, signalled what Reporters Without Borders described as “the end of pluralism in the mainstream media.” India’s media has fallen into an “unofficial state of emergency” since Narendra Modi came to power in 2014.
Around 70% of media outlets are linked to BJP-affiliated conglomerates, notably Reliance and Adani, raising grave concerns about independence. which caused India press freedom decline.
The concentration of media ownership in the hands of conglomerates with documented proximity to the ruling government creates a structural conflict of interest that no amount of editorial independence claims can resolve. When the owner of a news channel is also a business partner of the government being covered, the editorial pressure — spoken or unspoken — is self-evident.
Journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, best known for his investigations into the businesses of billionaire tycoon Gautam Adani, said personal electronic devices including laptops, mobile phones, pen drives and hard drives belonging to about 90 individuals — most of them journalists — were confiscated by police during raids and not yet returned.
Beyond arrests and legal harassment, the India press freedom decline in 2026 is also measured by what does not happen — specifically, the failure to hold perpetrators accountable for violence against journalists.
The Committee to Protect Journalists’ Global Impunity Index places India 13th in the world for unsolved journalist murders, with 17 unsolved cases between 2014 and 2024. India has appeared on this list every year since its inception in 2008. No conviction has been upheld in a journalist murder case.
This is the hardest number in this entire article. Not one conviction. Not one case where a journalist’s killer has been conclusively brought to justice and had that justice upheld by courts. Seventeen murders. Zero convictions that have stood. U.S. News & World Report
The facts documented in this article are drawn entirely from internationally published indices, government records, court proceedings, and statements by press freedom organisations that have been operating for decades. They are not the product of political opinion.
What they collectively describe is a media environment in which:
The findings underscore a sustained global decline in press freedom over the past quarter century. The report warns that the erosion of journalistic freedom represents a deepening global crisis with far-reaching implications for democratic institutions and public accountability.
A free press is not merely a media industry concern. It is the mechanism by which citizens of a democracy hold power accountable. When that mechanism is weakened — through law, through ownership, through fear — accountability itself becomes optional. And when accountability becomes optional for those in power, the consequences are felt not in newsrooms but in every institution, every examination hall, every courtroom, and every household in the country.
Q1. Where does India rank in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index? India ranks 157th out of 180 countries in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders. It remains in the “very serious” category and dropped six places compared to its 2025 ranking of 151st.
Q2. Which laws are being used against journalists in India? The primary law used against journalists is the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) — a counter-terrorism statute that allows extended detention without bail. The IT Rules 2021, sedition provisions, and defamation laws have also been used extensively.
Q3. Who owns most of India’s mainstream media? Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries owns over 70 media outlets reaching 800 million Indians. Gautam Adani acquired NDTV in 2022. Together, BJP-affiliated conglomerates control approximately 70% of India’s mainstream media outlets.
Q4. How many journalists have been killed in India without a conviction? The Committee to Protect Journalists documents 17 unsolved journalist murders in India between 2014 and 2024. India has appeared on the CPJ Impunity Index every year since 2008. No conviction in a journalist murder case has been upheld by courts. The reason behind India press freedom decline.
Q5. What happened to journalists who covered Operation Sindoor critically? At least 125 people — including journalists and social media users — were detained between April and July 2025 for content classified as anti-national or critical of Operation Sindoor. Several remain in protracted legal proceedings as of May 2026.
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