India, July 11 -- When Norwegian journalist Helle Lyng called out to Indian PM Narendra Modi in Oslo in May - "Why don't you take some questions from the freest press in the world?" - she apparently started an echo that has now travelled to at least two more countries along with Modi.

After an Indian diplomat was asked the same question about the PM in Auckland, New Zealand, Lyng made a series of X posts and said she is encouraged to see impact spreading. The New Zealand episode came a day after a television reporter in Australia remarked that Modi "famously avoids unscripted news conferences".

"It is nice to see that other countries are continuing the discussion about declining press freedom in India," Lyng wrote on X after videos from...