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JFA expresses concern over newspaper closure notices

By AT News |

Guwahati: Journalist Forum Assam (JFA) has expressed serious concern at the closer notices issued by the management of two Assam based daily newspapers and urged Assam government to take initiative for possible re-launching  both the newspapers owned by the Kolkata based by Saradha Group. The forum also asked the management to release the outstanding salaries to the journalist and non-journalist employees at the earliest.
In a press statement issued by the JFA president Rupam Baruah and secretary Nava Thakuria, the organization revealed that the management of Sakalbela, a Bengali daily and Seven Sister’s Post, an English daily published from Guwahati had issued closer notices recently from its Kolkota office and since the first week of April 2013 both the newspapers have not been circulated and printed.
Mentionable is that Sakalbela had employed nearly forty working journalists and another hundred media employees and similarly Seven Sister’s Post had around fifty working journalists and hundred other employees. The sudden closer notice issued by the Saradha Group chairman cum managing director Sudipta Sen has forced all these newspaper employees to turn unemployed.
The media reports from Kolkata suggest that all the newspapers and television channels owned by the Saradha Group have been closed down. More ever, the Saradha Group chief Sudipta Sen remains untraced for many days. The affected employees of the group have also lodged FIRs in local police stations.
The media employees based in Assam have alleged that they have not received their monthly salaries for the last two months. The JFA has  asked the Saradha Group management to immediately release their outstanding salaries and other due benefits (including the PF). The forum also appealed to the State chief minister Tarun Gogoi and State labour minister Prithvi Majhi to pursue with the management for reviving the production of both the newspapers and also providing due-financial benefits  to nearly three hundred worried employees at the earliest.

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