Unknown assailants have shot dead two Indian journalists in two neighboring eastern states within 24 hours, bearing out the country’s notoriety as Asia’s worst one for reporters.

On Friday, gunmen slew Rajdeo Ranjan, the head of Hindi-language daily Hindustan’s bureau in Bihar State’s Siwan district.

“He was shot from very close range. We rushed him to a hospital where he was declared dead on arrival last night,” said the district’s police chief, Saurabh Kumar Sah. The Indian Express said the 42-year-old was shot in the head and neck by a group of attackers after leaving the workplace.

“We are focusing more on the professional angle since he may have written some things about certain people, which may have led to this,” the police official said.

Earlier, gunmen fatally shot television journalist Akhilesh Pratap Singh on his way home in the Jharkhand state.

“It is not immediately clear if the journalist had (received) any threat from anybody,’ The Express reported, citing Upendra Prasad, a senior state police official.

Paris-based NGO Reporters Without Borders ranked India 133rd out of 180 countries based on its World Press Freedom Index for 2016, putting the country three places above its previous ranking, but naming it as the worst one for journalists across the continent.

Converted to a five-point scale, the ranking places India among the countries on the fourth scale, which indicates “very difficult situation.” The three countries at the bottom of the list are Turkmenistan (178), North Korea (179) and Eritrea (180).