Attempt to gag media

 There is much to be said about the way the NDA government under Narendra Modi has been handling the issue over purchase of 36 Rafale jets and perhaps, the most vicious being the threat to use the Official Secrets Act purportedly issue on media especially The Hindu for publishing the Rafale deal. Reacting to the government’s charge, The Hindu’s N Ram said documents related to the Rafale deal were published in public interest and nobody would get any information on the sources that provided them. It may be recalled that the Hindu on March 6, published more evidence of how the Narendra Modi government sabotaged India’s negotiating position and sold the country short in the Rafale deal with French aircraft manufacturing giant Dassault Aviation. The government told the Supreme Court that documents related to the Rafale aircraft deal have been stolen from the Ministry of Defence and, and threatened The Hindu newspaper with action under the Official Secrets Act. Supreme Court advocate Prashant Bhushan had petitioned the Court for a review of its December 2018 ruling dismissing the need for a CBI inquiry. The government said the petition was based on the documents revealing the Indian Negotiating Team documents which were published by The Hindu that were submitted to the government in July 2016, and an eight-page dissent note by three domain experts from the INT. The Governmental Agreement between India and France for the 36 Rafale fighter jets was signed in September 2016.The government’s plea was that since the documents were stolen the petition filed by Prashant Bhushan for a CBI inquiry ought to be dismissed and that the newspaper should instead by hauled under the Official Secrets Act. The issue reverberated across the nation with Editors Guild, INS and other media organisations expressing deep concern over the threat issued on the media. The Editors Guild of India had “unequivocally” condemned the Attorney General’s remarks (and also later reiterated by finance minister Arun Jaitley) before the Supreme Court. The Guild said the threat to use the Official Secrets Act was “reprehensible” .The acquisition of 36 Rafale jets has come under a cloud with the opposition led by the Congress trying to corner the government ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections on charges of supporting big business and helping them secure lucrative contracts as a spin-off in the deal. The opposition has said that the price per jet as negotiated by the National Democratic Alliance-government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is much higher than what was originally agreed to in 2012 by the then Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government. The government has contended that all rules and procedures were followed in the acquisition process that aims to bolster the Indian Air Force’s depleted fighter jet fleet. The Official Secrets Act carries a punishment of four to fourteen years imprisonment if it was found that sensitive security matters or documents were accessed by the enemies of the state that endangered the national security. Some experts have said that the purchase price difference between what the UPA-II had bargained and the final price agreed to by the NDA were not specific about security aspects. After saying that the documents were stolen, the government later retracted that statement. The issue over Rafale thus, reveals how the government intends to keep the matter under wraps despite it being in public domain for a year.