Chandigarh, June 26 -- Former Punjab Chief Minister and Akali patriarch Parkash Singh Badal on Tuesday said constant vigil by people besides a strong and independent media were required to protect India's secular democracy from overt and covert threats.
No one should have the courage to launch an "open and frontal assault" on the country's democratic fabric the way former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi did on June 25, 1975, he said in a statement here.
"But the tendency in governments to curtail civil liberties and basic freedom on the one or other pretext will always remain a threat in any society, where people are not vigilant and the media freedom is compromised in one way or the other," he said recalling the imposition of the internal E...