Jaishankar calls World Press Index ‘mind games’: Why the ranking is questionable

The World Press Freedom Index published by the non-profit organisation Reporters Without Borders has been making news recently in India after the ranking showed New Delhi to be lagging behind even Kabul when it came to the freedom of the press. On Sunday, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar also took a sceptical view of the ranking – India has been placed at the 161st position out of 180 countries, behind countries like Afghanistan (152), Pakistan (150) and Somalia (141). During the interactive session on the Foreign Policy of the Modi Government, when asked about India’s poor performance, S Jaishankar reacted, “I was amazed at our number. I thought we had the most uncontrollable press, and somebody is getting something fundamentally wrong. “Afghanistan was freer than us. Can you imagine? Look, these are all I mean, I see the democracy index, freedom index, religious freedom index, and press freedom index.”

He called the entire exercise as “mind games”, adding that these are the ways of playing mind games which are like lowering the rank of the country whom you don’t like while others do not. **Also read: Western Neo-colonialism? Why India rejects opinion-based, perception indices where Afghanistan, Hong Kong fare better** But who decides this ranking? How exactly is this ranking decided? Here’s a look. What is the World Press Freedom Index? The World Press Freedom Index is an annual ranking of countries, evaluating the level of freedom available to the media. Since 2002, it has been published each year by the Reporters Without Borders group. For the unaware, Reporters Without Borders or Reporters Sans Frontiers (RSF) is a global media watchdog with its headquarters in Paris. According to their website, they are neither a “trade union nor a representative of media companies”. It was founded in 1985 and over the years has consultative status with the United Nations, UNESCO, the Council of Europe and the International Organization of Francophonie (OIF). The RSF’s most visible initiative is the World Press Freedom Index is, however, not an indicator on the quality of journalism. How does it decide the ranking? The RSF’s ranking is based on responses of experts to a questionnaire of 83 questions. This questionnaire is put forth to various freedom of expression NGOs, many of which are funded by the RSF, a network of 150 correspondents and researchers, jurists and human rights activists. The questionnaire is used to calculate scores on six parameters in the index – pluralism, media independence, media environment and self-censorship, legislative framework, transparency and quality of infrastructure that support production of news and information. The questions are mostly in ‘yes and no’ or multiple choice formats. One of the examples of the question asked is – ‘In the past 12 months, have the authorities blocked accounts or had posts deleted in response to the posting or sharing of journalistic content?’ Along with the questionnaire, RSF also combines the quantitative abuses and acts of violence against journalists to come up with the overall World Press Index score. Based on this data, the RSF compiles its scoring which is placed into five categories. If the score is between 85-100 points, you are in the green category, which notes that press freedom is ‘good’. The next is the satisfactory category of 70-85 points. The third is the problematic category where countries score between 55 and 70 points. The fourth and fifth categories are the difficult and very serious categories where scores are 40-55 points and 0-40 points respectively. [caption id=“attachment_12561462” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Graphic: Pranay Bhardwaj[/caption] What do the rankings reveal this year? The World Press Freedom Index released this year on 5 May painted a not-so-pretty picture for India. It pushed India’s ranking from 150 to 161 this year, a drop of 11 places. Interestingly, when this ranking began back in 2002, India was initially placed at the 80th spot. The RSF said that “the situation has gone from ‘problematic’ to ‘very bad’ in three other countries: Tajikistan (down one at 153rd), India (down 11 at 161st) and Turkey (down 16 at 165th)”. In its report, the RSF further noted, “The purchase of media outlets by oligarchs with strong ties to political figures is another phenomena that dangerously hinders the free flow of information.” **Also read: China biggest global jailer of journalists, exporter of propaganda content: Press group** Shockingly for India, Afghanistan had a better ranking and was placed at the 152nd spot. Meanwhile, Norway came out on top, followed by Ireland and Denmark. When it came to the worst countries, it was North Korea at the bottom, followed by China and Vietnam. Why is the ranking criticised? External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar is not the only one to criticise the ranking. Earlier in March, Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur had said that the government did not subscribe to the rankings. “The World Press Freedom Index is published by a foreign non-government organisation, called Reporters Without Borders, and the government does not subscribe to its views and country rankings and does not agree to the conclusions drawn by this organisation,” he had then written in a response in Rajya Sabha. He said this was owing to various factors, including a “very low sample size, little or no weightage to fundamentals of democracy, adoption of a methodology which is questionable and non-transparent”. A previously-published NITI Aayog report also highlighted issues with the questionnaire used to gather data. It states that question-wise or category-wise scores used are not made public, nor is the list of respondents provided. It also adds that the questions are biased in nature. Another criticism of the index is that it usually ranks developing countries, which have government media ownership lower than other countries. However, countries like Denmark and Norway, which usually rank high, provide direct subsidies to the press. Hence, this raises a huge question on the credibility of the ranking. There’s also the question of funding to RSF. The Street reports that through their funding, billionaires, including George Soros via his Open Society and Pierre Omidyar, have indirectly shaped RSF activities. In return for French and US funds, the RSF has been largely silent about media abuses in France and the West. And it’s not just India that has raised questions on the credibility of the ranking. Fifteen years ago, Singapore’s then-PM Goh Chok Tong had denounced the index as “a subjective measure computed through the prism of Western liberals.” Today, Singapore continues to rank low on the index – it is ranked at 129. With inputs from agencies Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.