A police officer stands at the entrance to the office building where the Indian tax authorities raided the BBC’s office in New Delhi on February 14, 2023
Sajjad Hussain/AFP via Getty Images
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Sajjad Hussain/AFP via Getty Images
A police officer stands at the entrance to the office building where the Indian tax authorities raided the BBC’s New Delhi office on February 14, 2023
Sajjad Hussain/AFP via Getty Images
More than a dozen Indian Income Tax officials entered the BBC’s Delhi and Mumbai offices on Tuesday morning, seizing the BBC staff’s accounts, financial documents and phones. They ask those who have not been to the office to stay at home. More than 100 employees were in the office at the time.
The searches come weeks after the BBC aired a two-part documentary series critical of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. India: Question Modi examined Modi’s role in anti-Muslim attacks that killed hundreds in his home state of Gujarat in 2002.
Modi’s government banned it from showing in India and forced social media companies like Twitter and YouTube to take down clips using urgent law.
After the documentary aired, a Hindu nationalist organization petitioned the country’s Supreme Court to ban the BBC in India. Supreme Court lay off It.
A spokesman for Modi’s party held a press conference and told the media that the BBC was “trash” and accused it of “corruption”.
The BBC said it was “fully cooperating” with the Indian authorities.
Last year, India reduced 150 out of 180 countries surveyed by Reporters Without Borders in its annual Press Freedom Index, the lowest ranking ever.
