The Press Club of India, Indian Women’s Press Corps, Mumbai Press Club, Guwahati Press Club, Brihadmumbai Union of Journalists and Delhi Union of Journalists condemn the government’s attempt to intimidate the media by issuing show-cause notices to three leading TV channels, ABP News, NDTV 24x7 and Aaj Tak, for their coverage of Yakub Memon’s hanging.
It is shameful that cable TV rules have been invoked to question the right of the media to air views or do stories that run contrary to the decisions of the government and the Supreme Court on capital punishment in general and Memon’s case in particular. We are shocked that the Information and Broadcasting Ministry is party to such an assault on free speech. The action betrays an insecurity and intolerance on the part of the government. We urge Prime Minister Narendra Modi to intervene and immediately withdraw the notices which had been issued in the context of Yakub’s hanging.
The government should respect the media’s responsibility to reflect diverse opinions, even on sensitive issues such as death penalty, national security and communal harmony. The fact that Yakub’s funeral went off peacefully nails the suggestion in the show cause notices that the media reports in question had stoked trouble and incited violence.
4 Jun 2017 - 1:01pm | AT News
Senior Congress leader Tarun Gogoi has thrashed thr BJP led NDA government at the Centre for banning sale and slaughtering of cattle under the law against the cruelty to the animal.Addressing a press...
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Over 14,000 selected candidates received appointment orders from Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi at a function in Sarusajai on Saturday. The appointment of lower and upper primary teachers is on...
28 Mar 2014 - 2:38pm | AT News
Congress workers in Jorhat Lok sabha constituency are working with redouble vigour a day before prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh’s poll campaign on Saturday.Dr Singh, who represents Assam in Rajya...
29 Jul 2016 - 2:49pm | AT News
Assam flood scene deteriorates further on Friday with more and more areas coming under the surging waters of the Brahmaputra and its tributaries. The toll has gone up to 27 in 22 affected district...
ULFA general secretary Anup Chetia’s extradition is imminent. Union home minister has left for Dhaka on Monday where is set to sign the extradition treaty. The treaty will be signed during the home minister's visit to Bangladesh on Monday.The extradition treaty will pave the way for deportation of jailed ULFA 'general secretary' Anup Chetia, Tripura insurgent leader Vishwa Mohan Deb Barman, NDFB leader Thulunga alias Tensu Narzery and many other insurgents from the northeast who have been hiding in Bangladesh.New Delhi has been mounting pressure on Dhaka for Chetia's deportation since long. The ULFA leader has been in a Dhaka jail following his arrest in 1997 on the charge of entering...
Properties worth Rs 1 crore has been reduced to ashes when a major fire broke out in Nalbari town on Monday. The fire broke out at a garment shop because of an electric short circuit in the wee hours which later engulfed the adjacent shops. Five fire tenders took several hours to douse the fire.Similarly, a devastating fire broke in Lakhimpur town on Monday damaging goods worth several lakhs in the morning.
The local businessman injured in the shocking shoot out in Dhubri is battling for life on Monday. Police have yet to nab the miscreants involved in the incident that rocked the district hours after the post Republic Day. The incident took place in Gauripur when unidentified miscreants started indiscriminate firing at Daschok at around 7-30 in the evening.Gauripur police rushed to the spot and the local residents admitted the businessman to the hospital. But the miscreants managed to flee from the spot.
Guwahati police claimed to have arrested a gang of notorious kidnappers I connection with the kidnap of a Guwahati-based hotelier’s son two months ago.Police on Saturday night arrested five persons including a woman from Silchar who kidnapped the son of a businessman from Sonapur in November and demanded Rs 1 crore for safe release. Later they freed the boy for Rs 50 lakh as ransom. The women prepared the entire blueprint. Interrogation is going on at Panbazar police station.
Anti-big dam protest will take an aggressive turn as NHPC resumes construction of the projects at Gerukamukh. Addresng a press conference in Guwahati n Sunday, KMSS and AJYCP and TMPK have threatened to resume massive agitation if the works are not stopped immediately.KMSS leader Akhil Gogoi said that NHPC has gone back to its promises six months after it promised to stop working. Miffed at these development, the three organizations are preparing to go all out against it.
Defying the diktat of separatist militants in northeast India, the media fraternity of the city has celebrated the 64th Republic Day of India at Guwahati Press Club. Following the tradition, the media persons and other patriotic citizens had assembled in the campus of the pioneer press club of the region in the morning today and hoisted the national flag. Social worker and a former legislator of Assam, Ajay Dutta unfurled the tricolor in presence of the media persons and paid his heartfelt tributes to the martyrs of India’s Freedom movement.In his brief speech, Dutta remembered the contribution of thousands of martyrs for their sacrifices which finally brought the freedom to India. He paid...
The Delhi government has agreed to set up a statute of Chaolung Sukapha in the national capital. The assurance came from Delhi Chief minister Sheila Dixit who talked to her Assam counterpart Tarun Gogoi. Before that Gogoi in a letter requested Dixit to consider the proposal to set up the first Ahom king in the national capital. The initiative assumes significance after the government invited unprecedented criticism for not giving due status to the Ahom king.
Local residents in Goalpara district beat him a suspected militant to death on Saturday night. Three motorcycles suspected to have been used by the militants were recovered from the area.One bomb is suspected to be concealed in the MLA's house and a bomb disposal squad of the police reached the place, they added. Another IED went off at Jaleshwar High School. The other explosions in Goalpara district took place at Moriakichi Bazar, Gaurnagar, Porahita and Jamadar Bazar areas. In Dhubri, the areas hit by the blasts are Airketa, Sirajkuthi and Metarteri.
A series of low intensity blasts has forced the security forces to fan in lower Assam on Sunday. Suspected ULFA militants on Saturday night set off eight IED blasts in a space of 90 minutes targeting the house of an AIDUF MLA and crowded markets in Goalpara and Dhubri districts. There, is, however, no report of casualty.ULFA, along with some other insurgents group, gave a call for boycotting the Republic Day celebrations. The first blast took place inside the residential complex of Moinuddin Ahmed, MLA of All India Democratic United Front, at Jaleshwar in Goalpara district.
Over 20 people have been injured when a passenger bus slipped into deep gorge in near Guwahati on Saturday.The accident took place at around 2-30 in the afternoon when the passenger bus was on its way to Kamakhya and suddenly it lost control and fell on a gorge where several people were rescued by police and local residents.
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