Oh I'll take the firsthand reports of escapees over your thoughts on the matter, any day.

North Korean defectors are well known for being unreliable sources. They rarely have skills nor social connections and thus are massively incentivized to join the existing markets for anti-NK propaganda in both the West and India.

The kind of obvious propaganda like "it's a crime to have the same haircut as Kim Jong-Un" (or to not have it, depending on the source). No one is saying life there is great, but there is a track record of fantastically untrue stories.