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Cameraperson: Shiv Kumar Maurya
Video Editor: Vivek Gupta
This is how the Bombay High Court described the FIR and investigation against The Quint's Poonam Agarwal for her groundbreaking video expose of the 'sahayak' system in the Army.
It is no surprise then, that Justices More and Dangre proceeded to quash the FIR filed against Agarwal and Kargil war veteran Deepchand, ending a two-year ordeal for them, during which time they have been smeared with unfounded accusations of spying and abetment of suicide.
The judgment of the high court, on 18 April 2019, sends a powerful message to those who think they can silence independent journalism, and to those who think they can suppress the truth when it is inconvenient.
The importance of this message cannot be overstated.
It was not long ago that the Attorney General of India was threatening to slap criminal charges under the Official Secrets Act against journalists who revealed inconvenient truths about the government's dealings.
Poonam Agarwal has had to actually deal with being booked under that colonial era law – previously used to silence freedom fighters.
In the meantime, the matter has dragged on for two years, hindering Agarwal’s ability to do her job and leading to trolling and abuse on social media. Her story and professionalism were unfairly questioned by sections of the media. She was pressured to withdraw her petition in the Supreme Court on abolition of the sahayak system and misuse of OSA against journalists – pressure she resisted. Her petition remains pending to this date.
And yet, as the judges point out, the complaint and investigation are absurd.
On 24 February 2017, The Quint published a video of the sting operation conducted by Agarwal, in which she recorded conversations of several army jawans who talked about the menial work they were forced to do as part of the sahayak system.
The sahayak or buddy system is a practice in the Army that is used by officers to make jawans perform tasks like taking dogs for a walk, taking children to school, driving wives of officers to parlours and shops.
The practice was banned by the Army, including by a circular dated 19 January 2017.
Agarwal took careful steps to ensure the jawans' identities weren't revealed, including blurring their faces.
But two weeks after the video was published and went viral, Lance Naik Roy Mathew, one of the jawans she'd spoken to, was found dead in an abandoned barracks. The body was found hanging in suspicious circumstances.
This proved a trigger for a criminal complaint to be filed by another jawan from the camp, against Poonam and Deepchand, who had helped set up her meetings with the jawans.
In addition to the traumatic experience of being blamed for another human being’s death, the OSA charges were extremely serious.
They implied the Army and government viewed them as anti-nationals, and also made it tougher for them to get bail, and caused great hardship in their lives.
These accusations were so outlandish that the high court actually stayed the investigation in an interim order on 1 September 2017, but sadly, the attempt to quash the FIR took time because of delaying tactics from the state's lawyers.
Thankfully, even though it has taken two years, the judgment by Justices Dangre and More recognises just how baseless all of this was.
As a result, they held that "the case initiated against the applicants is without any factual foundation and any further investigation would only result in sheer harassment to the applicants without any fruitful result."
They also expressly state that Agarwal and Deepchand were "wrongly implicated in the said FIR".
This is very, very important for press freedom.
That tells you everything you need to know about the legitimacy and bona fides of what was done to Agarwal and Deepchand, who have nonetheless conducted themselves with dignity throughout the ordeal.
Journalists and whistleblowers face this kind of intimidation and harassment every day, when they try to bring important information to light.
But the old adage, satyameva jayate, has been upheld by the courts in this case.
Poonam Agarwal stands vindicated, and The Quint will continue to fight for the truth to come to light, whether it's about the sahayak system, or other misdeeds of those in power.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)