Silencing dissenting voices in India

'Human rights activists and environment campaigners have criticised the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying their efforts have led to harassment and other reprisals since it took power more than a year ago. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) cancelled Greenpeace's permit to operate in India on Friday, in the latest move against nongovernmental organisations.
"The MHA's clumsy tactics to suppress free speech and dissenting voices are turning into a major national and international embarrassment for this government," said Vinuta Gopal, Greenpeace India's executive director, in a statement.

Teesta Setalvad is a rights activist working with survivors of the 2002 religious riots in Gujarat state, in which nearly 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed. At the time, Modi was Gujarat's chief minister. After the riots, Setalvad set up Citizens for Justice and Peace - a legal rights initiative to ensure victims' stories were heard in Indian courts. Setalvad's organisation's legal aid to riot victims has led to the conviction of 126 perpetrators, including a minister of the former state government and some Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party members.

But her work has come at a price. Since 2004, she has been detained seven times, accused by Indian police of embezzlement, kidnapping, and tutoring witnesses - allegations she denies. Until 2014, she said, the charges against her were brought by Gujarat state police, but the most recent run-ins with the law have involved India's elite police agency, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). "Now - with the centre of animus and power shifted to Delhi - the CBI carried out an illegal search on our office and home," Setalvad said. "We also know that petty vindictiveness guides the vision of this government, led by the man at the top."...'