Not the foreigners, ask us what we feel.

"The ministry of external affairs is mulling a 'world democracy report' as well as a 'global press freedom index' to be brought out by an independent Indian think-tank, according to people familiar with the matter and government documents reviewed by HT (Hindustan Times)." Trouble is, will anyone, except Bhakts who believe that Prime Minister Narendra Modi can walk on water and levitate across the nation, believe a word of the report, given the way 21-year old Disha Ravi was abducted from her home in Bengaluru by Delhi Police and locked up for weeks without any evidence. Modi promised "freedom of speech and expression" in 2014, but "Six years on, many believe, India's democracy looks diminished, by what they say are persistent attacks on the freedom of the press," reported BBC. Investigative news magazine Caravan has suffered. "Ten sedition cases have been brought against three of its senior-most editorial stuff - the publisher, editor and executive editor - in five states for a story and tweets relating to the death of the protester." The Indian government took strong exception to a discussion in the British House of Commons on the protests by farmers from Punjab and Haryana against 3 farm laws which were forced through the Indian Parliament without any discussion. India says how it treats its citizens is its internal matter just as China claims on its treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang province. Bhakts may see nothing wrong in persecution of citizens but outsiders are noting a similarity between India and China. It is "Time to send a strong message to Britain," fulminated Kanwal Sibal. "The British high commissioner in Delhi was rightly summoned to lodge a protest but that may not be enough to close the matter. Some conclusions have to be drawn about the British mindset towards India that assumes that its provocations can be cost-free." What Sibal seems to be forgetting is that this government is using laws of the same British against its own citizens. What is the point in setting up a huge committee to commemorate 75 years of Independence from Britain if it is using the British law of sedition to silence opposition, enacted in 1870 by Thomas Babington Macaulay to enforce allegiance to the British monarch? To control the coronavirus spread the government enforced a draconian lockdown with a 4-hour notice on the basis of the Epidemic Diseases Act enacted by the British in 1897 which gives emergency powers to authorities while protecting them against any claims for damages. It must be very embarrassing for the British that an 'elected' government is using colonial era laws to persecute its citizens. "The blunt assertion is that outsiders have no business assessing our democracy. The baseline of the repartee is that voters elect a majority and that is all democracy is all about," wrote Suhas Palshikar. "India's democratic exceptionalism is now withering away," wrote Prof Ashutosh Varshney. "A democracy which speaks with one voice, which elevates citizen duties over citizen rights, which privileges obedience over freedom, which uses fear to instil ideological uniformity, which weakens checks on executive power is a contradiction in terms." "A new report by the US Congress's non-partisan and autonomous research service has taken a critical view of India's handling of the farmer protests, warning that New Delhi's position on the ongoing stir could 'present a challenge' for the Biden administration," When Bhakts need to morph Queen Elizabeth's picture for approval, Britain cannot be blamed in thinking we are still a vassal state. If you treat citizens like dirt the world will relegate you to the dustbin. A police state doesn't understand.