Last week, the Delhi government celebrated an act of mass surveillance, issuing a self-congratulatory press release, as reported in ‘Delhi ahead of NY, London in terms of CCTV cameras installed per sq. mile’ (IE, August 26). The press release marks the CCTV installation as a competitive metric based on a study by the consumer research website Comparitech. It notes that Delhi has 1,826 CCTVs per square mile, ranking it above 150 global cities. This statistic and the press release are symbolic of the populist messaging that comes at the cost of accountable governance.