CAAJ Statement condemning attacks on media-persons during
anti CAA-NRC protests in India
28 December 2019
As students and young people across
India have taken to the streets to peacefully protest the amendment to the
Citizenship Act (CAA) and the manner in which the Narendra Modi government
intends putting together the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the
National Population Register (NPR), police personnel have responded violently
against media-persons who have been reporting and recording audio-visual
evidence of the agitations by the youth across the country. The condemnable
high-handed behaviour by the police is a clear attempt at suppressing and censoring independent reportage.
The actions of those responsible
for upholding law and order – but who have been complicit with particular state
governments – represent a clear instance of “shooting the messenger.” It is
noteworthy that the worst attacks against both the protesters as well as
media-persons have taken place in states ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party,
in particular, Uttar Pradesh where most deaths have taken place. In their
insidious attempts to paint peaceful students as violent destroyers of public
property, police personnel have registered false cases against many of them,
including those belonging to the minority community. This explains the attempts
by the police to prevent journalists from performing their professional duties
in an unbiased manner. Media-persons working with international news
organisations as well as those in news agencies that are usually supportive of
the government, have not been spared the heavy hand of the police.
The actions of the police are in
keeping with the intolerance displayed by the Modi government over the last
four and a half years. Not only has much of the media been reduced to
advertising agencies and public relations offices of the ruling regime, the
small section of journalists that are still willing to hold truth to power, and
the news organisations employing them or supporting them, have been financially
squeezed and sought to be bludgeoned into submission. Never since the days of
Indira Gandhi’s Emergency that lasted 19 months between June 1975 and January
1977, has the right of the media to uphold the fundamental right to free
expression of each and every Indian citizen that has been enshrined in Article
19(1)(a) of the Constitution, been sought to be so brutally put down as it is
at present. Making matters worse, the social media has been weaponised and
converted into a propaganda tool for disinformation, almost invariably
favouring the ruling regime.
Every right-thinking person in the
country must strongly condemn the police action against media-persons and
uphold their rights and responsibilities to report and record the truth as it
is unfolding on streets every day across the length and breadth of India.
Otherwise, we should stop describing ourselves as a democracy – that too, the
world’s largest one – as attempts are made by those in power to ruthlessly
stifle dissenting voices in authoritarian, majoritarian and Fascist ways.
Committee Against Assault on
Journalists condemns police action upon journalists covering anti CAA-NRC
protests in all possible terms and urges the journalist fraternity to come out
and defend their Right to Freedom of Expression and Speech as enshrined in the
Constitution of India.
Anand Swaroop Verma
A K Lari
Paranjoy Guha Thakurta
Rajesh Verma
Santosh Gupta
Shesh Narain Singh
(CAAJ Statement Committee)
Twitter: https://twitter.com/caajindia
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