Ho hum. The end of another year, and another press freedom report is released. And, yet again, the 2008 Reporters without Borders certainly paints a gloomy picture of the region. Pakistan, ranked 152 out of 173, Afghanistan (156) and Sri Lanka (165) suffer from the internal bleeding of violent conflict, while there is political chaos in Bangladesh (136) and, of course, the military regime in Burma (170). But why do India, the second-largest democracy in the world (118), and the newly democratic Nepal (138) rate so low? Or is there a question to be asked about this scale itself, when Bhutan, with its benevolent but firm clamping down on dissent, is ranked relatively high, out of Southasian countries, at 74?
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| All drawings by Bilash Rai |