Dangerous Environment: How Reporting on the Earth Can Be Deadly
Is environmental journalism the new conflict reporting?
The details are blurry. Uttar Pradesh journalist Jagendra Singh succumbed to burn injuries in June last year. He had posted articles implicating Ram Murti Singh Verma, a UP minister in illegal mining and land seizures. Verma was later booked in connection with the killing.
A key witness to his death initially claimed Singh was burned by the police, but she later changed her statement, claiming he had self-immolated. As the investigation was carried forward, conflicting reports emerged.
In another case, the charred body of Sandeep Kothari was found after he reported on illegal mining in Maharashtra.
Since 2005, around 40 journalists have been killed for environment-related reporting around the world. The majority of these deaths have been in India, according to Reporters Without Borders, an international NGO.
Many of the world’s largest industries succeed with a certain amount of environmental destruction. From the fossil fuel industry burrowing holes into the earth and releasing global warming greenhouse-gases, to the Coca Cola company releasing production-related chemicals into rivers in India.
Tackling these large organisations comes with a degree of danger, recalls Tridip Mandal, former producer for CNN-IBN. Mandal, who now works at The Quint, used to work on the show Citizens for Earth.
In 2008, he and his team were roughed up for shooting an illegal mine in Goa. Men attempted to break his cameras and seize the tapes, but they were able to get away when the police arrived. The mine was later shut after the report aired.
As the world enters its most challenging years of environmental destruction yet, will environmental journalism become the new conflict reporting?
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