Newslaundry Podcast

In this episode of NL Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan, and Mehraj D Lone are joined by Pratik Sinha, co-founder of AltNews.Abhinandan asks what everyone thinks about the interrogation of journalists during the pandemic, Arnab Goswami being the most prominent example. Pratik says the issue comes down to “what is more primary: freedom of speech, or right to life”. He brings up how Goswami once targeted Umar Khalid and a subsequent attack on Khalid’s life. “Is it okay for news anchors to carry out hate-mongering day in and day out, endangering the lives of people much less privileged than them?” he says.Madhu believes free speech is important, and Goswami should be allowed to say whatever he did. But, she adds, “everybody else also has the freedom to follow up on it”. On Arnab being questioned for 12 hours, she says “the police rarely acts on its own”, and something as major as questioning a journalist “usually comes somewhere from the top”. What one needs to ask, she says, i