KEY POINTS
- The ABC’s India reporter has returned to Australia after a campaign of intimidation by PM Narendra Modi’s government.
- A decision to withhold Dias’ visa came after an episode of Foreign Correspondent about Sikh separatism aired last month.
- Critics accuse the government of enforcing an authoritarian brand Hindu-nationalism and using state institutions to silence dissent.
By Zach Hope
The ABC’s lead India correspondent Avani Dias has returned to Australia after a campaign of intimidation and bureaucratic meddling by the nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A decision to withhold Dias’ visa came after an episode of Foreign Correspondent about Sikh separatism aired last month and before the final instalment of her podcast investigating the life of Modi.
Lobbying from the office of Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong won Dias, from the ABC’s South Asia bureau, a mere two-month visa extension – but it was not delivered until after she and her partner had packed up their New Delhi home and made arrangements to leave.
They flew to Australia the next day, which was also the opening of India’s weeks-long national elections. Modi and his right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are expected to win comfortably.
Dias discusses the situation in the finale of her podcast series Looking for Modi.
“The Modi administration gave me the visa in the very last minute,” she says in the episode.
This story was originally published in smh.com.au. Read the full story here.