New Delhi: More than 150 people, including activists, artists, professors, journalists, veterans, scientists and retired bureaucrats have condemned the recent attempt by Goa Police to detain Shamita Yadav, who goes by ‘The Ranting Gola’ on social media. In a statement that has been widely shared, they called the action a “terrifying new escalation” of a “coordinated campaign” to silence her voice as a political satirist.Yadav’s primary and secondary social media accounts were arbitrarily suspended before the incident with the police. “A democracy cannot claim to be free if its state police force is weaponised to act as an enforcement wing against comedians,” says the statement, whose signatories include Annie Raja of the National Federation of Indian Women, Supreme Court advocate Anjana Prakash, Ashish Joshi of the Constitutional Conduct Group, peace activist Cedric Prakash, noted scientist and rationalist Gauhar Raza, historian J. Devika, Kavita Srivastava of the People’s Union for Civil Rights, Meera Sanghamitra of All India Feminist Alliance, social activist Shabnam Hashmi, Tushar A. Gandhi of Mahatma Gandhi Foundation and filmmaker Vani Subramanian, amongst others.The satirist has faced a slew of actions, including her accounts being blocked or restricted in India, a court case filed by a BJP leader alleging her posts defame him and, the latest, a ‘raid’ on her residence by Goa Police, who reportedly arrived without a warrant for her arrest, and were unable to detain her because of her lawyer’s timely intervention.Yadav posts short and sharp video commentary on current events and politics on social media, which often go viral. She has been outspoken about the legal and extra-legal actions taken against her and she has been critical of the Modi government’s policies. Her account on Meta-owned Instagram, the.ranting.gola, is restricted (blocked to viewers) in India.Instead of Yadav’s original Ranting Gola account, a message from Instagram appears instead, saying the account is blocked, with the following detail, “We received a legal request to restrict this content. We reviewed it against our policies and conducted a legal and human rights assessment. After the review, we restricted access to the content in the location where it goes against local law.”“Simultaneously,” says the statement, “the police have targeted the organisers of her live, physical performances, demanding financial records, account details and payment histories. This is a malicious tactic designed to choke her livelihood, terrorise her professional network and completely dismantle the ecosystem that allows an independent artist to survive.”The statement says the suppression of her right to democratic dissent had moved away from the digital domain – having her posts deleted or accounts withheld – to “direct physical intimidation and financial harassment by state machinery”.Earlier in May, the Delhi High Court had ordered the deletion of some of Yadav’s social media posts on a plea by BJP spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia.In 2025, Uttar Pradesh police had registered a complaint against Yadav alleging “anti-Bharat propaganda”, filed by an advocate, Amita Sachdeva. The video that reportedly led to the complaint had Yadav saying: “Is asking questions from the government sedition and provocative?” in the context of the Pahalgam terrorist attack in Kashmir.