Recently, a reporter with an English daily in Kashmir wrote a story on daily wage earners trying to feed their families during the lockdown to contain the coronavirus. Some said they were running out of money to buy food and medicine, and had not got government rations.
To get the government’s version, she contacted a senior official in the Srinagar administration. “He provided me with details on WhatsApp – this number of families have been given food, this is the number of food kits we are distributing,” she said. “But then he said he is not to be quoted.”
The journalist needed an official quote on record. “When I called him asking for an official response, the call was forwarded,” she said. “When I called his spokesperson, he said he was not available.”
The reporter did not use the information given off the record. In the end, the story was published with a line at the bottom saying that particular government official was not available for comment. The same day, the editor of the newspaper received an irate call from the official.
A few days earlier, she had a story on a fire in one of the “red zones” of Srinagar. These are areas that have been...
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