Documentary on Gauri Lankesh adjudged best human rights film
Bengaluru (PTI) "Gauri," a documentary based on late journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh, directed by her sister and award-winning director Kavitha Lankesh, has won the 'Best Human Rights' film at the Toronto Women's Film Festival 2022.
The film has been selected also for the South Asian Film festival of Montreal and is in consideration at Doc New York, International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam, Sundance Film Festival, and other festivals across the world.
Kavitha Lankesh, in a statement, said the documentary exposes the physical and verbal threats journalists face every day in India.
There were over 200 reported attacks on journalists in India in the last five years, out of which over 30 of them were murder in the last decade, she said. The attacks range in severity but the intention behind them matter, she said.
India's number in the global press freedom index is 150 out of 180, she further said and added that attacks on dissenters and journalists are unfortunately not new nor limited to India, but it is the intensity in which the attacks have taken place in the last decade is something to be concerned about.
Gauri Lankesh was shot dead on the night of September 5, 2017, from close range near her house in Rajarajeshwari Nagar in Bengaluru.
According to the statement, the documentary film Gauri has been commissioned by Free Press Unlimited, Amsterdam.
Free Press Unlimited mission stems from Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that says everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers, it said.
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UK Professor Nitasha Kaul's Overseas Citizenship of India cancelled
Academician decries move as "transnational repression"
London/New Delhi: Professor Nitasha Kaul, a London-based academic, announced on May 18, 2025, via a social media post that her Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) card has been cancelled by the Indian government. She described the move as a "bad faith, vindictive, cruel example of transnational repression" intended to punish her for her scholarly work critical of the Modi government's policies concerning minorities and democracy.
The cancellation follows an incident in February 2024 when Professor Kaul, who holds a British passport and held an OCI card, was denied entry into India upon arrival at Bengaluru airport. She had been invited by the then Congress-led Karnataka state government to speak at a conference on "The Constitution and Unity in India."
According to an image of the letter shared by Professor Kaul, the Indian government stated that it had been "brought to the notice of the Government of India that you have been found indulging in anti-India activities, motivated by malice and complete disregard for facts or history." The letter further accused her of regularly targeting India and its institutions on matters of India's sovereignty through "numerous inimical writings, speeches and journalistic activities at various international forums and on social media platforms."
Professor Kaul, who is a Professor of Politics, International Relations, and Critical Interdisciplinary Studies and the Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD) at the University of Westminster, London, vehemently rejects these accusations. She stated she had provided a 20,000-word response to what she termed the government's "ridiculous inanity about ‘anti-India’," but the OCI was cancelled through a "rigged process."
In her social media posts, Professor Kaul lamented the decision, questioning how the "mother of democracy" could deny her access to her mother in India. She characterized the action as stemming from "thin-skinned, petty insecurity with no respect for well-intentioned dissent."
The February 2024 denial of entry had already sparked controversy. At the time, immigration officials reportedly cited "orders from Delhi" without providing formal reasons, though Professor Kaul mentioned informal references to her past criticism of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The Ministry of External Affairs had then responded by stating that the entry of foreign nationals into India is a "sovereign decision." Unofficial government sources had indicated that a "preventive lookout circular" was issued against her due to her alleged "pro-separatist" and "anti-India" stance on Kashmir.
The BJP in Karnataka had criticised the state government for inviting her, labelling her an "anti-India element." Conversely, the then-Karnataka government and various international human rights organizations and academic bodies had condemned the denial of entry.
Professor Kaul has been an outspoken commentator on Indian politics, including the abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir, and has testified before international bodies such as the US Congress on human rights in the region. She maintains her work is academic and pro-democracy, not anti-India.
The cancellation of her OCI card effectively bars her from entering India, a country to which she has personal and academic ties. This incident adds to a growing list of academics, journalists, and activists of Indian origin whose OCI status has been revoked or who have been denied entry to India in recent years, raising concerns about freedom of speech and dissent. Reports indicate that over 100 OCI cards were cancelled by the Indian government between 2014 and May 2023. Furthermore, in 2021, new rules were introduced requiring OCI cardholders to obtain special permission for activities such as research and journalism.
