Dear Reader,

The world observed the World Press Freedom Day on May 3rd. A day prior, Reporters Without Borders released their annual Press Freedom Index for 2025. India saw a marginal improvement in its ranking among 180 countries—rising from 159 last year to 151 this year. Despite the higher ranking, it was lower than all its immediate neighbours except for Pakistan, Afghanistan, China and Myanmar.

India, the Index notes, continues to be a place where press freedom “is in a crisis” marked by “violence against journalists and highly concentrated media ownership”. The Index points out that there is an “unofficial state of emergency”, with an average of two to three journalists killed every year because of their work.

One such journalist, killed for his work, was 32-year-old Mukesh Chandrakar in Chhattisgarh’s Bastar. With a long and fiercely independent record of reporting for national media, and on his own YouTube channel ‘Bastar Junction’, on issues of the tribals in the district, he was in the crosshairs of the local powers that be. In January this year, his investigations into the alleged irregularities in the construction and expansion of the 52.4 km Nelsanar-Kodoli-Gangaloor (NKG) Road in the Bailadila area resulted in his brutal murder.

In a compelling and chilling report, The Reporters’ Collective goes to Bastar to traverse the ground that Chandrakar travelled. The story relives his life, his work, and the tragic events that ultimately led to his brutal killing—symptomatic of the threats to life and liberty that independent journalists in India face, especially in the far corners of the hinterland.

Last month, Telangana became the third state in India to release a draft bill for the registration and rights of gig workers, after Rajasthan and Karnataka. The draft Telangana Gig and Platform Workers (Registration, Social Security, and Welfare) Bill, 2025, aims to formalise the working conditions of a rapidly growing industry which is estimated to be in the region of eight million workers nationwide and expected to grow to about 24 million by 2029. In Telangana alone, there are about half a million gig workers, who are projected to grow to 1.3 million by the end of the decade.

While the Bill proposes a welfare board and defines platform responsibilities, the state’s gig workers’ union points out that the proposed legislation suffers from key lacunae—no minimum pay, no income guarantee, deactivation without appeal, lack of provisions for social security and insurance, and the absence of algorithmic transparency. Medianama examines the provisions of the Bill and notes that the national Code on Social Security, 2020—which provides a framework for welfare schemes for unorganised workers at the national level—has not been implemented despite receiving the President’s assent.

Last month, The Probe’s investigations and reporting led to the rescue of 46 bonded labourers from Moga in Punjab. These labourers were trafficked from the little-known village, Banhera Khas, in Saharanpur district, in Uttar Pradesh. Delving deeper, The Probe found a chilling pattern of child exploitation. Children, some as young as six, are abused, exploited, and forced into labour. A revealing and horrific tale of entrenched bonded and child labour practices that continue to go unheeded and unpunished.

Government rules in Uttar Pradesh mandate that brick kilns cannot be set up within a kilometre of a habitation. Defying this guideline, the land mafia has reduced the village of Lahuwar, in the Ghazipur district, from a green haven into a dry, smoke-filled, barren landscape.

Water, once an abundant resource, is now scarce. Agricultural fields are arbitrarily dug up for clay, and the crops, whatever remains of them, wither before time. Pigeon peas, or arhar, grow black instead of green. Locals allege that this is the result of collusion between brick kiln owners and the local administration, skirting government regulations, Janchowk reports.

For more such stories from the grantees this week, please read on.

Warmly,

Sunil Rajshekhar
IPSMF