Bastar Contractor Arrested After Journalist’s Body Found His Property; Prashant Kishor Arrested by Patna Police; Government Publishes Draft Rules for Data Protection Act

A newsletter from The Wire | Founded by Sidharth Bhatia, Pratik Kanjilal, Tanweer Alam, Seema Chishti, Sushant Singh, MK Venu, and Siddharth Varadarajan | Contributing writer: Kalrav Joshi, with additional inputs by Anirudh SK

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Snapshot of the day

January 6, 2024

Sidharth Bhatia

Two days after Bastar-based investigative journalist Mukesh Chandrakar was found dead in a newly sealed septic tank at the property of contractor Suresh Chandrakar, police in Hyderabad arrested Suresh on Sunday, a senior cop in the city confirmed to reporter Naveen Kumar. Kumar also cites Bastar police as saying that Suresh is the prime accused in the case. Mukesh’s brother in his police complaint reportedly said that Mukesh had received threats from Suresh and others after he reported on alleged irregularities in the construction of a road in the region. NDTV had aired Mukesh’s investigation just two weeks ago.

A little over four months before he died, Mukesh had co-written a story in The Wire Hindi about how four Bastar-based journalists were arrested “in an evidently false case” after reporting on illegal mining in which BJP leaders allegedly played a role. The article suggested that the police planted evidence on the journalists in order to frame them. In this eulogy of Mukesh, TWH editor Ashutosh Bhardwaj recalls that Mukesh, after receiving a disapproving text from a senior cop, had asked him anxiously if something bad could happen to him. Bhardwaj writes:

“A few months later, he was found murdered, the two episodes conjoined by a belief the administration-criminal nexus in Bastar share – that journalists can only survive at their mercy.”

Organisations representing news outlets, DIGIPUB, have expressed shock and demanded that the Chhattisgarh government should carry out a speedy investigation into the death and bring the culprits to justice. The association also noted that India’s ranking on the press freedom index has declined rapidly in recent years. “Threats to the safety and security of journalists are not just posed by retaliatory action by the State, which has taken centre stage in the past ten years, but also by criminal elements, different kinds of mafia groups and local politicians,” it said.

The Indian Council of Medical Research has detected two cases of human metapneumovirus or HMPV, in Karnataka,