When Indian television reporter Dev Kotak went to cover a massive youth protest against Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government this week, he planned to deliver a live broadcast, mill around and leave.
Instead, amid chants of "godi (lapdog) media", he was beaten by dozens of protesters, because his channel is seen as pro-government. Mobile phone cameras captured the assault and the clip later went viral on social media.
The physical attack on Kotak was unusual but through the protests, which gained momentum last week, people have heckled and abused crews from almost all of India's mainstream television channels, calling them pro-government and sold out.
"The mob might have actually killed me. There was a seething anger among them because they felt the media hadn't reported their side of the story," said Kotak, 36, who covers general news for the Times Now channel.
"There were slaps, kicks, punches and water bottles being thrown. I was very scared and feared for my life; I just wanted to get out alive."
Anger has boiled over especially since a police crackdown on tens of thousands of protesters marching on parliament on Monday injured many students.
"People kept shouting that we hadn't shown their side of the story." Kotak said. "That's simply not true — I've reported injuries on both sides."
Times Now's editor-in-chief, Navika Kumar, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
The hostility towards reporters reflects a broader debate over declining media freedom in the world's most populous democracy since Modi took office in 2014 and started dominating Indian politics.
India's ranking in the Reporters Without Borders' World Press Freedom Index has deteriorated sharply over the past decade. The country ranked 122nd in 2010 but fell to 157th out of 180 countries in 2026.
The Paris-based media rights watchdog has attributed the decline to violence against journalists, concentration of media ownership in business that are aligned with the government and growing political polarisation.
The Editors Guild of India condemned what it called ire "directed at representatives of the media outlets considered close to the government and the ruling party".
But it also said: "Flawed and biased reporting not only makes a bad situation worse, but has more serious and longer-lasting consequences which impact the fabric of our society and also weaken the media's position as one of the key pillars of a functional democracy."
The Information and Broadcasting Ministry and Modi's office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party declined comment.
NEWS HAS BECOME ANTI-PEOPLE, SAYS VETERAN EDITOR
Prominent journalist Ravish Kumar, a winner of the Ramon Magsaysay Award, regarded as Asia's equivalent of the Nobel Prize, is credited with coining the term "godi media", which has spread widely because it also rhymes with Modi.
The term has come to include almost all TV channels and some national newspapers for what critics say is their lack of scrutiny of government, coverage of Modi that borders on the fawning and ignoring or criticising any dissent.
"The godi-media is anti democracy, anti-people, anti-opposition," Kumar said. "They vilify any opposition, label critics as agents of foreign governments, and barely ever feature voices of political parties from opposition."
A spokesperson for the protest movement, led by the Cockroach Janta Party, said organisers had repeatedly urged demonstrators not to mistreat reporters.
"We have urged and we keep urging protesters to not misbehave with godi-media," said Deepak Baliyan.
"Let them do their job. We want to make sure that no one gets mistreated here."
Manisha Pande, editorial director of news website Newslaundry, said the distrust was the product of years of growing disillusionment with mainstream television news.
"We have always had propaganda, partisanship, opinion-driven prime-time news," Pande said. "But what has really happened after 2014 is that you have seen a clear shift in how news has become anti-people."
Digital commentator Akash Banerjee said the decline in trust of traditional news outlets had helped drive audiences toward independent online platforms.
"The fact that the media has stopped questioning the government has resulted in a rise of alternative digital media, which would not have happened otherwise," said Banerjee, a former Times Now journalist whose YouTube channel now attracts millions of followers.
The crowds chanting against television crews were expressing years of accumulated frustration, he said.
Pande warned the rising hostility carried its own dangers.
"The worrying part is that the anger has now taken on a life of its own," Pande said. "For many protesters, a reporter is no longer seen as an individual but as the face of a thick-skinned media establishment that is responsible for their pain."
