Reporters Without Orders Ep 305: Changing Ayodhya, Agnipath protests, Ujjain ‘spitting’ case

This week, host Shivnarayan Rajpurohit is joined by Newslaundry’s Basant Kumar and Avdhesh Kumar along with independent journalists Shweta Desai and Kashif Kakvi.

Shweta was in Ayodhya to report on locals’ fear and excitement over the Ram Mandir project. She says they’re happy it’s being built but are worried about the city’s ‘redevelopment’ wrecking their homes and livelihoods. She also explains why there’s tension between Ramanandi akharas and the temple trust.

Basant spoke to youths in the temple town for their views on the BJP and Ram Mandir, and also visited the site of the proposed mosque – to find nothing there.

Away from the Ayodhya mayhem, Kashif reported on the release of a Muslim teenager in Ujjain, five months after he was jailed for purportedly ‘spitting’ on a Hindu procession. He says there was no evidence and hostile witnesses, but the administration had bulldozed the accused’s home anyway.

Finally, Avdhesh talks about why students were protesting at Jantar Mantar and why they’re upset with the government’s Agnipath scheme.

Tune in!

Timecodes

00:00:00 - Introduction

00:01:34 - Ayodhya’s redevelopment

00:11:06 - Battle to control the temple

00:19:53 - Land acquisition in Ayodhya

00:34:31 - False cases in Madhya Pradesh

00:49:57 - Negative impact of Agnipath Yojna

00:53:53 - Recommendations

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Produced and edited by Saif Ali Ekram, and recorded by Naresh Kumar.

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