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Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

theguardian.com

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Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#51

Post by rhaway84773 »

mikymoothrowa wrote: post #42
InTheArena wrote: post #36

India is increasingly going down the slippery slope of repression that we have seen frequently in countries about 5-10 years before they lose their collective minds, and everyone wonders when the state "went bad".

[flagged]

India is not even a hundred year old democracy. It’s way too early to speak about its robustness as a democracy.

Especially considering India has already had a non-Democratic period during emergency, which the previous leadership of the BJP understood the dangers of, since many of them were arrested then, but the current leadership seems keen on basically establishing as the norm.

Unfortunately the hubris and over-confidence you’re displaying is in itself a huge factor in a country losing its democratic nature.

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#53

Post by swarnie »

benbristow wrote: post #43

So the Indian government have got all the time in the world to raid offices over tax but don't do anything over scam call centres scamming innocent victims all over the world.

As bad as it is, if you've got 30 minutes free when they call who doesn't love stringing a tech scammer along by playing dumb for a bit.

When Piyush explains why those DCOM errors in event log are super super important it brings a little joy to my heart

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#54

Post by manquer »

zakember wrote: post #32
_23sd wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BBC doesn't release most of their documentaries in the US. I wouldn't assume there are any plans being held up, it's just too niche for any US distributors to bother. Maybe the interest due to India trying to ban it will change that...

I never understood the Indian ban. Aren't BBC documentaries available in the UK only anyways? Indian residents couldn't have accessed it without a VPN anyways.

Hardly only the UK, BBC world and many other divisions like the recently shuttered BBC Arabic focused on content and distribution primarily in commonwealth or emerging countries .

iplayer is how you get free access in the UK to BBC because residents pay the TV tax for it . Rest of the world you pay for it in some way as part of cable deal , subscriptions etc, or BBC decides to make it free or ad supported .

——

Keep in mind BBC is no different than aljazeera it is state sponsored and is import part of soft power toolkit of the UK government uses

this doesn’t mean they are wrong or biased in anyway on the Modi documentary nothing in it is new or not widely known , for example until he became PM he was blocked from getting a U.S. visa for his role in the riots .

BBC content can be good like aljazeera (especially for non Qatari /ME content) can be but the inherent politics of it cannot be forgotten or ignored

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#55

Post by rhaway84773 »

zakember wrote: post #32
_23sd wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BBC doesn't release most of their documentaries in the US. I wouldn't assume there are any plans being held up, it's just too niche for any US distributors to bother. Maybe the interest due to India trying to ban it will change that...

I never understood the Indian ban. Aren't BBC documentaries available in the UK only anyways? Indian residents couldn't have accessed it without a VPN anyways.

It’s the result of a thin skinned paranoid government ruling the country.

There was gonna be absolutely no impact whatsoever if they had just kept quiet and not said a thing.

Instead their touchiness has meant that this has become a much bigger deal and is actually impacting their favorability negatively, at least anecdotally.

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#56

Post by ketralnis »

coliveira wrote: post #46
brucethemoose2 wrote: post #10

There was a great post from a VPN provider about how they've honed circumvention tactics in China for years, and that whatever Russia was doing post-Ukraine was just primitive in comparison. If India really tries to go down the internet censorship rabbit hole, its probably not gonna go well, as they are decades behind more seasoned despotic regimes.

The VPN doesn't matter a thing. The goal is to avoid mass access to subversive content, so it doesn't matter if someone somewhere can find a way to circumvent these measures.

At steady state yes, you want to control the overarching narrative sufficiently that nobody knows to ask the questions. But in the midst of protests like in Hong Kong a couple of years ago you may want specific measures to crack down in case the overarching narrative becomes "you should use a VPN"

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#59

Post by toast0 »

benbristow wrote: post #43

So the Indian government have got all the time in the world to raid offices over tax but don't do anything over scam call centres scamming innocent victims all over the world.

Well, are the scam call centers paying taxes? Are they scamming domestically or only internationally? Are they embarrassing the government directly, or only indirectly?

Re: Tax raids at BBC offices in India enter second day

#60

Post by zakember »

mikymoothrowa wrote: post #39
zakember wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why should a British funded propaganda machine be even allowed in a foreign country? Same reason why any other foreign website is allowed in India or why other countries watch Bollywood movies. Globalization is a win-win for everyone. No country in the world is self-sustaining.

every sentence of this is wrong. There are several foreign channels that are banned in India including Al Jazeera and for very good reasons. Plus, I’m sure the West doesn’t get Russia Today or CCTV right now. nor India’s DD

> There are several foreign channels that are banned in India including Al Jazeera and for very good reasons.

Al Jazeera isn't banned. In fact it is a free channel on most cable network providers

> Plus, I’m sure the West doesn’t get Russia Today or CCTV right now. nor India’s DD

Actually DD is also available in US, just like WION (another Indian news channel)

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