From Colonial Rule to Editorial Rule: The Correspondent Raj

We are told that India threw off the colonial yoke in 1947, built a vibrant democracy, and developed an independent press that speaks truth to power. We love telling ourselves this story. It makes us feel good about our post-colonial journey, our intellectual evolution, our hard-won sovereignty.

Except—It's not true.

Dear educated Indian reading this on your smartphone while sipping artisanal coffee, let me ask you something uncomfortable: When was the last time you shared a news analysis about India? Was it from Op India or The Hindu? Or was it that devastating piece from The New York Times about Indian democracy? That 'brilliant exposé' from The Guardian about Brahmanism? That "insightful" BBC documentary that "finally" explained the complexity of Indian society to... Indians?

Could it be that we never actually decolonized our minds. We just changed the color of our intellectual masters from white to... well, still white, but now with press credentials.

Naipaul once observed that "foreign journalists are more important in India than in any other country." But you probably dismissed it as the bitter ranting of a self-hating Indian writer, didn't you? Because that's what we do—we shoot the messenger when the message threatens our carefully constructed post-colonial self-image.

Let me walk you through your own intellectual colonization, step by step, because you're living it and don't even know it.

Step One: The Automatic Credibility Transfer
You know that little rush of validation you feel when a Western publication covers something you've been saying for years? That "finally, someone important is talking about it" feeling? That's your colonized brain treating white opinion as the gold standard for truth.

A local journalist spends months investigating corruption in your state. You scroll past it. The same story gets picked up by Reuters. Suddenly it's shareable, quotable, important. The foreign correspondent who parachuted in last week with Google Translate and a WhatsApp contact list has more credibility than the beat reporter who's been covering the issue for years.

Why? Because deep down, you still believe the Gora Sahib knows best.

Step Two: The Amplification Syndrome
Watch Indian media closely. Notice how stories become "real" only after foreign validation. An issue simmers for months in regional press. Then CNN covers it. Suddenly it's breaking news on every Indian channel, complete with "As reported by CNN..." chyrons.

We've created a bizarre hierarchy where Indian stories need Western stamps of approval to matter to Indians. It's like needing your ex-colonizer's permission to feel bad about your own problems.

Step Three: The Elite Validation Circus

This is where it gets really pathetic. Indian intellectuals, politicians, and opinion-makers constantly cite foreign press to validate arguments about their own country. As if local analysis lacks the genetic credibility to stand alone.

"Even The Washington Post says..." becomes the ultimate trump card in Indian debates. Even The Economist agrees... Even Foreign Affairs acknowledges... Even. Even. Even.

That word—"even"—reveals everything. It implies surprise that foreign media would deign to agree with Indian analysis, as if our perspectives are inherently suspect until blessed by Western attention. We've made foreign journalists kingmakers of Indian discourse while treating the few honest Indian journalists as court jesters.

And these western journalists aren't just reporting on India—they're deciding what aspects of India matter. They're authorizing which version of reality we're allowed to take seriously.

The psychological colonization runs so deep that we've convinced ourselves this is cosmopolitanism. We call it being "globally minded" when we're actually being intellectually submissive. We've confused foreign validation with objective truth.

Think about countries with genuine intellectual confidence. Do you see Chinese intellectuals constantly citing The New York Times to validate arguments about Chinese society? Do you see French elites needing American press approval to take domestic criticism seriously?

But in India, we've institutionalized this dependency. Our op-ed pages quote foreign journalists like scripture. Our policy debates wait for international media to set the agenda. Our cultural conversations revolve around how we're perceived by outsiders rather than how we understand ourselves.

Naipaul said it clearly: "Indian journalism developed no reporting tradition; it often reported on India as on a foreign country." We learned to see ourselves through colonial eyes and never unlearned it. We just updated the colonial gaze for the digital age.

The cruel irony is that we think we're being sophisticated when we're being colonized. We mistake intellectual insecurity for global awareness. We've convinced ourselves that foreign validation proves we're part of the international conversation when it actually proves we're still waiting for permission to trust our own voices.

This mental slavery makes us worse at understanding our own country. When we constantly filter Indian reality through foreign analytical frameworks, we lose the ability to develop indigenous ways of making sense of our complexity.

You don't have to trust me. Try this yourself. For the next month, notice your media consumption patterns. Count how many times you share foreign coverage of Indian issues versus domestic analysis. Watch how your respect for arguments changes based on whether they come from Indian or international sources.

Then ask yourself: In a truly decolonized mind, would the nationality of the journalist matter more than the quality of the journalism?

The gora sahib is laughing at us. Not because he conquered our land—he already left. But because he conquered something more valuable: our ability to trust our own intellectual judgment.

And until we recognize this colonization of consciousness, every press credential becomes a colonial document, every foreign correspondent becomes a surrogate administrator, and every citation of international media becomes an act of intellectual genuflection to masters who never actually left.

The first rule of decolonization is admitting you're still colonized.
But are you ready to stop waiting for permission to think?