Rana Ayyub
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Media TribeShaunagh talks to Rana Ayyub
In this episode, Shaunagh speaks to Rana Ayyub from the Washington Post.
Rana talks about smuggling a New Yorker magazine journalist, Dexter Filkins into Kashmir, how her reporting led to the arrest of Amit Shah, the now Union Home Minister of India, her undercover sting operation into the 2002 riots in India’s Gujarat province that killed more than 1,000 people and growing up as a young Muslim girl in India.
For those who don't know Rana
Rana Ayyub is an Indian journalist and author of “Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover Up.” She was previously an editor with Tehelka, an investigative magazine in India. She has reported on religious violence, extrajudicial killings by the state and insurgency.
For more on Rana
Follow Rana on Twitter and her stories published in The Washington Post here. You can find her book "Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a cover up" here.
Episode credits
Hosted and produced by Shaunagh Connaire and edited by Ryan Ferguson.
Episode transcript
Shaunagh Connaire:
Welcome to Media Tribe. I'm Shaunagh Connaire and this is the podcast that tells the story behind the story. It's an opportunity for you and I to step into the shoes of the most extraordinary media folk who cover the issues that matter most.
Rana Ayyub:
Well, the CPJ and Time Magazine did a list of the 10 most threatened journalists in the world, and I'm one of them.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Today I'm chatting to Rana Ayyub, Global Opinions Writer at the Washington Post. Rana is also the author of Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover Up. She reports on religious violence, insurgency and extrajudicial killings by the state in India. Now to say she is brave would be quite the understatement. Rana, thank you so much for being on my podcast.
Rana Ayyub:
Pleasure. Pleasure Shaunagh to be on your podcast.
Shaunagh Connaire:
It's lovely to finally put a face to the name and kind of meet in person. You're obviously in Mumbai at the moment Rana.
Rana Ayyub:
That's right. I'm in a very, very humid Mumbai right now, and we're just waiting for the rains to strike in.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Right. Slightly different to here. It's a scorcher out there today. But listen, Rana, I mean, we just discussed that we're of similar age, and you have achieved so much. I mean, your stories have been huge over the years. Do you want to kind of tell our audience a little bit about how you became a journalist?
Rana Ayyub:
Well, that's a long story, actually. I'm somebody who could have never been a journalist because I was an introvert. So I was born a cripple. I was born with a polio, the left hand and right leg. And I was clearly the kind of child who your friends and your relatives would be quite sympathetic towards. I think around the age of 19 I went to Gujarat, which is the province of Narendra Modi, who is now the Prime Minister of India. This was the time when one of the worst carnages in the recent history of India, one of the worst anti-Muslim carnage took place. It was 2002 and I went there as a relief worker. And about a thousand Muslims were slaughtered in the span of three days.
Rana Ayyub:
So I went there around doing my relief work, and I think it really struck, the kind of injustice that was around me, that a fact that a thousand people had been killed overnight, and the people who had killed them and the leaders who had given the orders were sitting in positions of power. And I went to relief camps, and there were pregnant women and those who were slaughtered, whose families were slaughtered. And they're all sitting there, and I wanted to do something. It was infuriating because I felt very helpless. And I guess that was perhaps the time that I thought that, "Yes, the only thing I can do is to raise a voice and to speak for these people is to do my journalism." And that's when I decided to be a journalist.
Rana Ayyub:
It took me a while. I joined a journalism institute, a journalism course in Mumbai. And I wasn't really the most brightest of children around. I was so shy and such an introvert that I went to a girls' school, a girls' college, a girls' degree college, a girls' postgrad institute. You would never imagine me to be a journalist, and just that, things happened, things started rolling. And I remember in my second television job, I was made a part of the special investigations team. And that's when I became a hardcore investigative journalist.
Shaunagh Connaire:
So I think it's really worth mentioning that you are a Muslim yourself Rana. And that's why when you went to Gujarat back in 2002, it was Muslims that were being slaughtered. And I mean, some of the stories that came out back then were just horrific. I've read and I think these have been verified, pregnant women's babies being ripped out and murdered. It was that awful. You're saying that's when you decided you needed to become a journalist. Can I take you back slightly further? I read that, I think at the age of nine, did you and your family, did you have to flee Mumbai because you're Muslim?
Rana Ayyub:
Yes. So I had a difficult childhood. When I was nine, we were living in Sahaar, which is a very cosmopolitan space. We were perhaps the only Muslim family living in a huge society of more than a thousand people. And my father was known as Masterji, basically, which is a term for teacher. And he was a revered figure. He was a revered figure by even the right wing guys who had their offices close by. The temple services would initiate from our households. I never really identified myself as a Muslim till on the 6th December 1992, when a Sikh guy who was our neighbour, Mr. Bakka, he came to our house, he banged the door, he was very anxious. And he looked at my dad and he said, "The girls need to be taken away."
Rana Ayyub:
And my dad said, "What happened?" They said, "The rioters are coming with swords, and they're coming for the girls." And my father was, I remember he was very anxious, and he used the word rape, I remember. And my mom just took me and my sister aside. And at that point my father said, "We have to let the girls go." And my mom said, "We have never let them go by their own. I mean, we can't." And somehow my dad persuaded my mom in that moment. And me and my sister, we sat on his bike, so Mr. Bakka was riding the bike, so we sat on behind him. We went to stay in the house of a Sikh family for months. We took refuge. And I remember when the neighbours of the Sikh family where we took refuge would come in, and they would pop by, and they'd ask, "Who are these girls?" And they would say, "Oh, they're refugees. They're Muslims from the neighbourhood." And that's the first time the word Muslim actually stuck to me because that's the first time I was given a religious identity.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Yeah. Yeah. And that's so important then because of the work that you went on to do. So it feels like you've kind of always been living on the sectarian lines of India, and that has inspired-
Rana Ayyub:
I've lived it. I have lived it.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Yeah. You have lived it, and that's what's inspired your work by the sounds of it. So I mean, big, big question for you Rana, is there a moment in your work, one particular story that you can really step back and say, "Gosh, I really achieved something here." I'm hoping you'll give me the answer. I've just read your amazing book, Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover Up. Everybody should read it. It really is wonderful investigative reporting and the risks you took were slightly insane, I must say.
Rana Ayyub:
Yeah. One of the biggest challenges and the most challenging story was the one that also works around the book, is the arrest of Amit Shah. The man who is now the home minister of India, the second in command, who's the most powerful man in the country right now. In 2010, he was the junior minister of state in Gujarat where the riots took place, the extrajudicial murder of Muslims took place. My investigation sent him behind bars. It was a huge moment because I was what? 26 then. We always do stories, but you never expect people to step down from office or them being incarcerated. You do your job as journalist. So I got hold of his call records and official documents, which nailed his role in the murder of a man and a woman. A couple. And the woman was raped, sedated, murdered, burnt alive and thrown in a river.
Rana Ayyub:
And she was also a Muslim. And she had just come from the hospital because she was getting the infertility checks done, and she was killed. And then of course, I linked him to the home minister. And the day he was arrested, my editor, I remember back then sent me a message that some stories do [inaudible 00:08:02] results. And I was looking at the television screens, and the television screens who were reading my stories. And the biggest television channels. And they were all outside saying, "Tehelka exposé nails Amit Shah." I was working with Tehelka. I think that was one of the biggest moments of my life.
Shaunagh Connaire:
So go back to how you actually were able to expose Mr. Shah. So you spent eight months, I think it was, undercover, you posed as a filmmaker from the American Film Institute. Do you want to talk a little bit about that? And the huge risks that you were taking Rana.
Rana Ayyub:
Right after I got Amit Shah arrested, I told my editor that we are just skimming through the surface. There's a lot more that needs to be uncovered. And he said, "What do you have in mind?" I said, "I think I want to go undercover." He looks at me, and he's like, "This 26 year old girl? What does she think she's talking about?" Because the organization where I was working, Tehelka, was infamous for its undercover operations. For its sting operations. So I said, "No, I think I need some sting cameras." He said, "What will you do?" I said, "Leave that to me." And he left it to me. And I got cameras stitched on my tunic, in my diary, in my key chain.
Rana Ayyub:
And I don't even remember the equipment, like the pen, the earing. There was so many of them. And I became this Hindu nationalist girl called Mitali Tyagi, whose father was a Hindu nationalist. She studied in America. She believed that Muslims should live as second class citizens. And she was a student at the American film Institute Conservatory. Because a friend of mine was then studying at the American Film Institute Conservatory, she had mentioned this in passing. So I managed to get a card made, I get a fake passport, lenses, changed my look, straightened my hair, overhauled completely. And the way I dressed, it was very chic. I really liked the journalist that I was. And I went undercover with a fake American accent. Very fake American accent.
Rana Ayyub:
We had a French intern at work. So he became my assistant director. And so armed with a white guy, which kind of validates your own existence when you are a foreign film maker. So I think armed with him for a company, I entered Gujarat, I befriended some of the most influential people in the films and political circles. We got ourselves entrenched in the circuit for the next two months. And then we became the most famous people in Gujarat, me and Mike. And then we familiarized ourselves with the cops, with the bureaucrats. And then we became a part of their family. And then across about six months from the home secretary to the home minister, to the commissioner of police, we had done a sting operation and almost everybody who made the most damning confessions about the role of the prime minister, and his second in command Amit Shah. And they spilled the beans in a span of six months.
Rana Ayyub:
And these would include conversations that each time they would say something relevant, I'll switch on the camera. And these were people who when inquired by the commissions of inquiry would say, "Oh, we don't remember," but in front of me they're talking like a parrot. So it's like, I just recorded all of it. And it was damning. I remember I wrote a mail to my editor that I've got this and he said, "This is going to be huge. You don't realize this." And of course it never got published.
Shaunagh Connaire:
So Rana, I mean, during your sting undercover operation, did you ever meet the current prime minister, Mr. Modi?
Rana Ayyub:
I did. He was the last person. I wanted him to be the last person that I met, that in case I messed up, in case things didn't go as planned, that would be our last thing to do. And so the last person that I met was Mr. Modi. And my colleague Mike was a French guy, he was really nervous. I said, "Just act normal." And I remember when we were sitting in the living room, the waiting room, I briefed him accordingly. I said, "We're not supposed to talk work. We're supposed to be the filmmakers at all times until we reach Delhi. We're not supposed to say anything." So we were talking about films and stuff, and Mr. Modi calls us inside and he says... And Mike in turn says, "Sir you're so popular that we have pictures of you in the [inaudible 00:12:07] Gujarat. You're such a popular guy. Mr. Modi started blushing and it's like, "Oh my God. I'm so popular with the French guys." So he had done the homework.
Rana Ayyub:
So I introduced myself. And Mr. Modi, he had a book on Barack Obama on his table. So he looks at me and says, "Mitali, someday I want to be like this guy." I mean, he was this provincial minster and none of us would have thought that he would one day lead the country. So he had a book on Barack Obama and he spoke to us about America and India. So he said, "Why are you making the film?" I said, "Sir, you have a huge audience. An Indian, American audience. The diaspora in America, which is Gujarati. And I want them to know the good work that you're doing and that you are the global leader the world needs."
Rana Ayyub:
So basically I kind of made it look like I was the person that he needed. This was also the time that Mr. Modi was looking to establish his image as this leader because America had denied him visa for his role in the 2002 genocide. So America had denied him visa. He wanted this acceptability, and it felt like my offer opened the doors for him. So he took me around, showed all the books written on him and he said, "You should come and do lunch with me the following week." And I went back and my editors were really excited. I showed them the footage of me talking to Mr. Modi on camera. And then my editor said, "We can't do this."
Rana Ayyub:
I said, "Listen, what do you mean?" He said, "Listen, you've got all the big guys, but this is too big." It just broke my heart. He said, "Promise us Rana that you're not going to do that." So that was the last meeting I ever had. And then I remember I gone to the meeting. I was getting calls from Mr. Modi's guy on my phone that we have to plan the lunch next. So I remember I told him that somebody in my house, a relative passed away. So he said, "Okay sure. Let me know and we can plan." And I just cut the sim card in two pieces. Threw the phone.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Wow. Oh my God. So Rana, the story never got published in Tehelka, but you went on to self-publish your book.
Rana Ayyub:
So I gave them the transcript of my conversation [inaudible 00:14:11] the undercover operation. And they took about a week or two, and then they just stopped communicating with me. And finally I just called [inaudible 00:14:21] manager, and I said, "Why are you guys sitting on this? This is a big investigation." And then one of my editors wrote back to me saying, "We found holes in your investigation, and flaws, some loose ends." I said, "Well, if there are loose ends, so let me fix them. Let me go back to Gujarat and let me..." They said, "No, I think you did a great job, but let's leave it at this." I said, "I wasn't a guinea pig that you sent for an investigation. And now you're saying, let's kill this." So of course there were many deliberations and I knew that the story could not be published. So I went shopping with various editors. I shopped my story around, and spoke to almost every editor in the country. Every publication. And they all said, "It's a damning story, but we can't publish it."
Shaunagh Connaire:
People are too scared I guess.
Rana Ayyub:
People are too scared. And finally, I had a book contract and the publishers eased out of the contract in 2014 when they realized Modi is going to be the prime minister. I had another contract in 2015, with publishers like [inaudible 00:15:08]. And finally, in 2016, I self-published this, which is this investigation in the form of a book.
Shaunagh Connaire:
My God. Your bravery is just, it's astonishing here because I'm guessing you get a lot of flack and you probably receive a lot of trolling online. Do you ever feel like your life is in danger?
Rana Ayyub:
Well, the CPJ and Time Magazine did a list of the 10 most threatened journalists in the world, and I'm one of them. So I don't know how does one feel being a part of that list. But yes, I mean, I've seen perhaps the worst. I've seen being doxed, getting threats and rapes and murder threats. In 2017 my image was morphed on a porn video, and that video was circulated all over. So I've seen the worst of it. And a colleague of mine, Gauri Lankesh, she was killed three years ago. And that same week we were supposed to publish Gujarat Files, which she had translated in the regional language.
Rana Ayyub:
So it's like, I seen it from close quarters. I've gone on a television studio, in a news studio, and in the middle of a television debate, I get a message on my phone saying, "Hey, we see you. We are downstairs." It's as close. But then after a point of time, you start living with it. Which really means that the kind of investigation that you're doing, the work that you're doing is resonating with people and that your work is important, and which is why people are scared, and sitting around nerves somewhere. So you also live with the satisfaction that you have done something, which is impacting people.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Exactly. So you're obviously doing something right if you're annoying that many people. I'm very sorry to hear that. I mean, you're saying all of that Rana, with a smile. It's really scary to hear that. And I guess being a woman in India can be tricky, never mind being a Muslim woman who has done significant reporting against the people who are in power. I mean, it is something quite spectacular. Next question Rana, is there a moment that you could pick out that slightly crazy? I feel like you might have quite a few of them, but one that you can pinpoint that you'd like to tell us about.
Rana Ayyub:
A recent trip Dexter Filkins of New Yorker was in India. So we had to go to Kashmir. And foreign journalists were not allowed. Foreigners were not allowed. And we were taking flights, which were only... He's like, "How we doing this?" I said, "Listen, I'm going to take you to Kashmir. I'm going to smuggle you in. But you promise me you're not going to open your mouth." He said, "Okay, how are we doing this?" I made him wear a kurta pajama with these scarves around his neck. And he's a very white guy. And luckily he has his goldenish hair, which makes him look slightly Kashmiri. So I made him wear his glasses and I said, "Keep coughing when you go to the airport, so nobody sees your face. And just shut up."
Rana Ayyub:
So we took the 5:00 AM flight. We were the only people except for two other people in the back who were on the fight to Kashmir. And I covered myself in a hijab. I wore glasses. The flight landed at 6:30 in the morning. So we put our stuff. And I'm like, "Okay. Dexter, here's the thing. There are CRPF guys standing outside. We have to walk past as if you are really sick and I'm escorting you. And we have to get out, sit in a cab and just leave." He said, "Okay." And he started coughing. Dexter starts coughing. And I'm like, "Yeah. Don't overdo it." We are walking towards exit, and I see these CRPF guys and I'm like, "Okay. There we go. There we go. We have this surely." And Dexter keeps doing this and we step out. And we get a taxi and he says, "Phew." And I said, "Dexter, not phew yet."
Rana Ayyub:
We are reporting the story. We go to a hospital. I'm walking in. Dexter's walking right behind me. And this cop, the intelligence official comes to me and says, "Are you Rana Ayyub?" And Dexter who's right behind me just runs. Okay. He runs. And that part of Kashmir there was no telephone. There was no internet. There was no communication at all. And Dexter is a foreigner in Kashmir who has no communication with me. So these guys grill me for an hour. I come out and I'm like, "Where the hell is Dexter?" In the meanwhile, Dexter has gone and hidden in the parking area. So after one hour I find Dexter in the parking area. And so we had the craziest stories. And then getting out of Kashmir. And then for him to publish that we sneaked into Kashmir. A lot of politicians tweeted that, "Rana you should be arrested for smuggling a foreign correspondent." But it was interesting as hell.
Shaunagh Connaire:
So this is really quite funny because you sound like such a daredevil. And you're saying you grew up as quite an introvert. It definitely doesn't sound like you're an introvert, especially when you're telling a western journalist to not talk. I mean, that's probably, totally counterintuitive to poor Dexter. That article in the New Yorker, it's something else, isn't it? It really gives you a great background about India and Kashmir. When you were going up there Rana, the way I understand it is article 307 was being repealed. And that would mean that Kashmir would lose its autonomy as a Muslim state. So things are really, really tricky. I mean, do you plan to go back there? You're probably banned, I'm guessing.
Rana Ayyub:
I'm not sure. But I remember when I went there for the third time, a Kashmiri journalist came to me and said, "The cops had orders to arrest you and then Delhi intervened." The centre intervened saying, "She cannot be arrested because if she's arrested, then it sends out an international message." I think now I have an international profile. I write for the Washington Post. I'm the Global Opinions writer. So I tweeted about what's happening in Kashmir. And there were not many journalists. There were journalists from the BBC and the Washington Post and New York Times who are just in Delhi, who are not allowed to go in. And they were sending their local reporters to Kashmir. And I was tweeting. And because I have a voice, I was tweeting about the human rights violation and Kashmir, when the special status was revoked.
Rana Ayyub:
And the day the special status was revoked, I was in New York and I remember CPJ and IWMF colleague said, "Please don't go back." And I said, "I'm sorry, but Kashmir is my... I have to go there." Because the story is that Indian Journalists and a state sponsored and state enabled and state supported journalists were saying, "Oh, all is normally in Kashmir." They'll go outside the lakes and say, "Here they are." And there are boats and people and tourists. And there was nothing. So when I went and reported about the human rights violation at Kashmir, the arrest of children and teenagers, I think there was a huge backlash by government officials. And they asked for my arrest. So yes, I think what's happening in Kashmir is a human rights violation. And I do intend to go back, especially to cover the pandemic, as soon as we have flights operating. Because that's one area that India chooses to forget all the time. It's like, we like Kashmiri land but we not do not want Kashmiri people.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Is there a sense Rana, that since Modi has come to power, that media in India has been bullied I guess, into just covering a more nationalist agenda? At least portraying a picture that all as well in India, when in fact press freedom is certainly being quashed. Muslims are on the fringes and that's why you feel the need to do such reporting. But do you sense that the press is really being bullied here?
Rana Ayyub:
I think if you come to India at any given point of time, and if you had to just watch the Indian news channels, you'd be like, "What the hell is the world talking about? It's all hunky Dory here." Like everybody is having a great time. There's no discrimination. And it speaks volumes of the state of Indian news media. It has been bending over backwards to accommodate Mr. Modi's majoritarian views. It has frustrated even before it was asked to bend. The way they are self-censoring their selves. The way they are demonizing the Muslim community. I remember when the pandemic began, one of India's leading news channels, India Today, had a graphic of the virus with a Muslim skullcap on top of it saying Muslims were responsible for spreading the virus in India. And Islamophobic stories that were on news channels in India.
Rana Ayyub:
Which led to the union minister for minority affairs saying that Muslims are talibanising the virus in India. So that's the level of majoritarianism, and that is being enabled and emboldened by our media. They're our voices. There is a backlash against the black lives media backlash. There are organizations like some television channels, but they are exceptions. And these independent voices, which are speaking against the regime have been targeted time and again. And journalists are attacked and journalists are threatened online. So the ones who are speaking are being silenced and the others have been self-censoring themselves.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Gosh. It's so disconcerting to hear that. And obviously now, you're a columnist at the Washington Post. I mean, how does it feel? You have a colleague who was murdered by the Saudis. You're saying all this Rana, I can't help but... How do you feel even knowing that?
Rana Ayyub:
I joined Washington Post within months of Jamal Khashoggi being murdered. And I remember I went to the Washington Post office, and I met the editor. When I returned, I told this to a friend, he said, "That's the best place." And I said, "Why do you say that?" He said, "They covered so much about Jamal Khashoggi's dead after he was killed." So I said, "Hang on." He said, "No, actually for a journalist like you it's the best place." But I'm really proud of being associated with Washington Post. An organization that has really stood by its journalists.
Rana Ayyub:
It's an honor that Jamal Khashoggi was also the Global Opinions writer, and I'm in the same place. Sometimes I feel like I've taken his place because right after he died, I joined the Washington Post, right after he was killed. And I think I have a bigger responsibility of speaking the truth because what's happening in Saudi. And the way Jamal was silenced was because of his criticism of the Saudi regime. Of course, I trust my regime to not do the same, but given the way things are, given the way the government has been silencing voices, It'd not be farfetched to compare them and the treatment of journalists.
Shaunagh Connaire:
Wow. Well, Rana I know you have to go. So thank you so much for coming on the podcast. It's extraordinary to hear about your career. And good luck with the rest of your work. Obviously it's so, so important. Thank you so much.
Rana Ayyub:
Thank you so much Shaunagh. It was great talking to you.
Shaunagh Connaire:
If you liked what you heard on this episode of Media Tribe, tune in next week, as I'll be dropping new shows every week with all sorts of legendary folk from the industry. And if you could leave me a review and rating, that would be really appreciated. Also, get in touch on social media at Shaunagh on Twitter or at Shaunagh Connaire on Instagram. And feel free to suggest new guests. Right. That's it. Until next week. See you then. This episode is edited by Ryan Ferguson.
