On a single day in October, the highest court in India was asked a question that would have sounded absurd a generation ago: who, exactly, is a journalist? The matter came before the Supreme Court of India not as a textbook dispute but as a Public Interest Litigation—a legal mechanism that allows Indian citizens to petition the courts on behalf of the public good, rather than for personal relief. The cause this time was unusually modern: a request to recognize, protect, and accredit a sprawling, ill-defined category of people who cover protest sites—freelance journalists, independent reporters, and social media influencers. The petitioners argued that without formal standing, these reporters were being shut out of public spaces, denied entry, and in some cases harassed for trying to do their work.
At the bench on October 16, 2026, senior advocate Indira Jaising—a veteran of India's gender-justice and civil-liberties bar—laid out the practical grievance. The Delhi police, she argued, were refusing to recognize independent journalists at protest sites, and were granting access only to reporters working for organizations accredited by the Press Information Bureau, or PIB. The PIB is the central government's communications arm, and its accreditation has long functioned as the default credential that unlocks doors in India: entry to government events, secure zones, and often the controlled perimeters around demonstrations. Jaising's framing was not anti-PIB, exactly. It was an argument that the media world had grown well beyond PIB's roster, and that the police's narrow gatekeeping was leaving a generation of legitimate journalists stranded on the wrong side of the cordon.
#WATCH | Noida, Uttar Pradesh: On Supreme Court ECI notice, Congress leader Supriya Shrinate says, "The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Election Commission seeking a response—a positive step, indeed. It is also welcome that the Election Commission has now acknowledged it will provide machine-readable soft copies to all political parties; however, this is not enough. They have effectively stolen votes in this country, attempted to dismantle democracy through such theft, and committed an act of treason. Most importantly, the Court made no remarks whatsoever regarding the Leader of the Opposition, Rahul Gandhi, yesterday...yet various media channels and debates propagated the false narrative that Rahul Gandhi had been reprimanded—when, in reality, the Supreme Court’s comments pertained to the sixth petitioner. Now that the written order is available, will those in the media who spread this falsehood offer an apology? Will they disclose the source behind such shallow journalism? Will that unbridled spokesperson for the BJP—who habitually lies both inside and outside the courtroom, and who sought to sow confusion again yesterday—apologise to the Court? By doing so, they are not only undermining the dignity of the Leader of the Opposition but are also misrepresenting the Supreme Court by attributing false statements to the Chief Justice of India. This constitutes contempt—not just against us, but against the Chief Justice himself..."
Chief Justice Surya Kant did not dismiss the concern, but he pushed the bench into harder territory. "We must keep reality in mind," he observed during the hearing. "If everyone starts claiming to be journalists and doing the work, it will lead to great confusion and problems in society." The court put the matter even more starkly in its own observation: if every citizen of the country sets out to become a journalist, it will create serious problems for everyone and the entire system. It was a sober caution, and it signaled that the court would not simply extend the protective umbrella to anyone who asked for it.
It acknowledged that the question of who counts as a journalist cannot be separated from the question of who gets hurt when the answer goes wrong.
Beside Kant sat Justice Joymalya Bagchi, who pressed on what may be the hardest part of the case: the distinction between professional journalists working for registered media houses and social media influencers. The categories sound academic until you think about what each one actually is. The registered journalist works inside a newsroom, carries an employer-issued credential, and operates under a long set of legal and ethical protections that have grown up over decades. The freelancer works outside that scaffolding, often alone, often paid per piece, often without a press card of any kind. The influencer operates in an entirely different economy—one of brand deals, audience metrics, and platform algorithms. Conflating all three, the court seemed to be suggesting, could dilute the very protections the petitioners were asking the bench to extend.
Supreme Court Contempt Notices to Sanjay Raut, Nikhil Wagle Over Criticism of CJI, Judiciary A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi passed the order on Friday. https://t.co/58swefEEme
Beneath the constitutional argument was a quieter and more urgent claim: that women journalists, particularly those without institutional backing, often absorb the worst of what happens at protest sites. The court indicated it was likely to lay down guidelines addressing the harassment of journalists and was considering the formation of an independent committee to investigate such complaints. The framing was significant. It acknowledged that the question of who counts as a journalist cannot be separated from the question of who gets hurt when the answer goes wrong. A definition drawn too narrowly would leave the most vulnerable reporters exposed. A definition drawn too broadly would invite the very chaos the chief justice warned about.
The bench is, in effect, being asked to design a small piece of infrastructure for a media landscape that has outgrown its old containers. Accreditation, recognition, and access at protest sites are not abstract questions—they determine which voices get heard in the public record of a demonstration, which images make it out of a crowd, and which reporters make it home safely. India's experience with protest coverage has long been contested, and the police's discretion at the perimeter has often been the first place that discretion is exercised. The court's task is to constrain that discretion without handing a press pass to anyone who claims one.
"These are not the issues that should come before court, you can issue an SOP on it," CJI Surya Kant observes while hearing @MahuaMoitra's plea against Circuit House eviction. SG Tushar Mehta tell court allegation that Moitra was evicted from Circuit House are false. SG Mehta: Circuit house was undergoing maintenance, which petitioner herself acknowledged. On date in question, no room had been allotted to anyone. Petitioner was courteously escorted. Petitioner was informed that Nadia Circuit House would remain unavailable for use wef. No officer or any person physically approached the petitioner to shift to any other accommodation. NO ONE, including petitioner, would be prevented in accordance with law.
For now, the matter remains before the court. No order has been issued, no committee has been constituted, and no guidelines have been formally adopted. But the framing of the hearing—sympathetic to unprotected reporters, wary of an open-ended definition—has set the terms of a debate that will outlive this particular bench. India is being asked whether the protections built up around a 20th-century press can be rewritten quickly enough to fit a 21st-century one. The court's eventual answer will do more than decide who gets a credential at the next protest. It will shape how the country understands the press itself.
