Saiyed Danish | India Tomorrow
New Delhi, June 10—A protest march organized by the concerned media individuals was held, in solidarity with Prashant Kanojia — and some other journalists — who was arrested from his home in Delhi by Uttar Pradesh police on Saturday for posting “objectionable” remark on UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath, outside the Press Club of India here today.
Kanojia, who has worked with The Indian Express and The Wire Hindi, had shared a video clip aired by a TV channel with his own comment. In the video, a woman told several TV channels that she wanted to marry Adityanath. She also claimed that she had video chats with him.
After Kanojia’s arrest, the UP Police also arrested the editor and head of the Noida-based television channel, Ishita Singh and Anuj Shukla respectively for airing the woman’s interview.
Prominent journalists from print and television fraternity and civil rights activists joined and raised slogans in support of free speech of media. Many termed the arrest of the journalist as “intimidating” and “brazen misuse of law”. They were wearing black arm bands and demanded that such harassment of media persons by the UP government should stop.
India Tomorrow spoke to a host of prominent journalists and civic leaders who took part in the protest march and gauged the mood of the agitation and resentment in response to incidents of government machinery targeting journalists.
Senior journalist and Editor of The Wire Siddharth Varadarajan also participated in the protest and expressed his deepest concerns on the travesty of such arbitrary steps taken against Kanojia. “This is a clear message sent to any journalist working in any organization that if you write something unpleasant about a chief minister or an MP or MLA or even if you tweet as a common citizen which irks the government then such action can be taken against you. That’s why we are here to protest against this growing trend.”
When asked if the arrest of Prashant Kanojia stands in contradiction to the Prime Minister’s claim to take even those along with him who oppose him, Varadarajan, former Editor of The Hindu, said, “Earlier the government’s slogan was ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas and now given that ‘Sabka Vishwas’ has also been added to it, the government still keeps failing to treat media fairly. In fact, the attack on us has intensified. Earlier, we would only get trolled on the social media but now we face arrests. So I think it’s the sharpening of the exercise of targeting us.”
Senior television journalist Rajdeep Sardesai emphasized on the need to do away with criminal defamation used rampantly against journalists. “We can’t single out the Yogi Adityanath government. This is happening across the country with many journalists being targeted by different government. A journalist was targeted the other day in Karnataka (JDS-Congress ruled) also. So this is a national problem. Let us not single out one government or one party. There is a general culture of trying to intimidate journalists and filing criminal defamation case against them is one the major abuse of law. We have to strike it down. The cases will come and go. So long as criminal defamation is there, the police will be there to resort to arbitrary arrest.”
“The way in which Prashant and others have been arrested is illegal. It is illegal because the charges slapped on them are against the law. He was arrested without a bail warrant and the kind of sections he is booked under does not match the accusation. So, the message they have given is clear. ‘You can’t write a particular thing because we don’t allow that.’ This is something very regrettable for our democracy,” said Mahtab Alam, Urdu journalist with The Wire.
After Kanojia’s wife Jagisha Arora moved the top court on Monday saying that the arrest of her husband was illegal as the police officers who arrested him Saturday afternoon failed to follow proper procedure, the Supreme Court will hear a plea against Kanojia’s arrest on June 11.
Several eminent civil rights activists also took part in the protest.
“This is an attack on press freedom. But this is also a signal from them aimed at to show journalists their place. You can’t criticize; you can’t raise your head under this system. People who think that Modi has changed in the new government are wrong. The situation in Modi 1 (Narendra Modi’s first tenure as PM from 2014 to 2019) is now becoming worse,” said Shabnam Hashmi of Act Now for Harmony and Democracy (ANHAD).
Congress leader Rajiv Tyagi was also present and participated in the protest march. “We live in India and follow the constitution. The constitution gives us right to speech. If the rights of journalists are secured then it is a good indicator for our democracy. Congress party believes that if journalists are free, the spirit of this country will remain democratic,” he remarked.
Delhi University Hindi Faculty Prof. Apoorvanand Jha, who joined the protest to extend his solidarity with Kanojia and others, also condemned the arrest of Prashant Kanojia by the UP police. “We should realize now that a full-fledged authoritarian regime has been established now in the country. When you attack journalists, you are basically closing the channels of real and genuine news reaching to the public. So it is a matter of closing the link between journalist and the people,” he said.
“It is not just about Prashant as there are so many such stories of innocent people languishing in jails and we don’t even know. The truth is being suppressed these days. I have seen that whoever tried to question Yogi government, he was treated unfairly. I tried finding out in Gorakhpur as to who adviced Yogi Adityanath to take such action (on Prashant Kanojia). Article 21 says everybody has right to speech,” said Dr. Kafeel Ahmed Khan of Gorakhpur Medical College, Uttar Pradesh. The Supreme Court has recently ordered the UP government to pay Dr. Khan his dues, thus giving a big relief to the renowned pediatrician suspended from the BRD Medical College & Hospital, Gorakhpur by the Yogi Adityanath government of Uttar Pradesh in August 2017 after 60 children had died between August 10 and 14 that year due to lack of oxygen cylinders.
