A Call to Lift the Media Bans

India and Pakistan’s media bans blocking access to each other’s news platforms are narrowing public exposure to cross-border perspectives. Several organisations and individuals have jointly urged India and Pakistan to unblock each other’s news websites and digital media platforms. The groups, which include Southasia Peace Action Network (Sapan), South Asians for Human Rights, the Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy, the Rural Media Network of Pakistan and various media outlets, warned in a statement released on January 14 that the escalating restrictions were undermining press freedom and the public’s right to information in Southasia. The Editors Guild of India released a similar statement the same day. The statement invites media organisations, journalist unions, civil society groups, academic institutions, and peace networks across Southasia to join them in collectively urging the governments of India and Pakistan to reverse the restrictions. More than 18 organisations and 85 individuals across the spectrum, from journalists to human rights activists, educators, and business leaders from Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, the United Kingdom, the U S, Canada, and Japan, have supported the statement, which is still open to endorsements. The appeal follows a series of reciprocal actions by the two nuclear-armed neighbours, which blocked access to each other’s news outlets amid heightened political and security tensions last May. Authorities in both countries have justified the measures on national security grounds, accusing each other’s media of spreading misinformation. ”Some media sites do spew hate and propaganda, both through mainstream outlets and social media and this toxic content is amplified by algorithms. But a blanket ban is not a solution as it also silences saner voices.”The bans are basically censorship that normalise information control during periods of diplomatic strain. Pakistan-India relations have been tense since the Partition of India in 1947 following the exit of the British. The two countries have fought four wars, in 1947-1948, 1965, 1971, and in 1999, a year after testing nuclear weapons. A fifth conflict flared up in May 2025, following a deadly attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir. Until about 12 years ago, India and Pakistan allowed two journalists each from across the border to report from the ground in each other’s capital cities. In 2014, Pakistan asked the two Indian correspondents in Pakistan, Meena Menon of The Hindu and Snehesh Alex Philip of the Press Trust of India,to leave. They did not give a reason, but the expulsion was apparently part of a tit-for-tat policy, since India had for some years been refusing permission for Pakistani journalists to report from Delhi. Now, media professionals from India or Pakistan are restricted to meeting each other in third countries sometimes facilitated by journalism programmes like the one in Kathmandu in 2024, organised by Hawaii’s East-West Centre. Reciprocal bans prevent people on both sides of the border from accessing news, perspectives, and information from their neighbours, further shrinking an already constrained public sphere. With India-Bangladesh relations deteriorating rapidly in recent months following repeated attacks on the Hindu minority community, such bans may be imposed anytime curtailing freedom of press in both countries.  [Contributed by Regina Johnson, the coordinating editor, Sapan News]