New Delhi/Srinagar: After belatedly renewing the license of the Kashmir Press Club on December 29, 2021, the authorities have cancelled it suddenly, ostensibly because of an adverse CID report. The issue of the renewal of the license had hung fire for months, and once the renewal notice was received the Press Club had belatedly announced elections.
The decision to suddenly cancel the license is now being viewed as a direct affront to the media fraternity and several journalists’ associations now denounce the “volte face” as inexplicable.
Press Clubs everywhere are information hubs where journalists exchange information and views, enabling them to perform their jobs better. They are also places where journalists stop and rest between hectic deadlines, while they wait for the next interview, the next press briefing…..They are places to get an affordable meal and a drink and socialize with colleagues. Press Clubs therefore are invaluable for the profession.
“In Kashmir, where journalism is a tough, risky, dangerous profession, the Press Club has played a vital role,” SK Pande and Sujata Madhok, respectively the president and general secretary of Delhi Union of Journalists, stated today in New Delhi.
“The Delhi Union of Journalists is dismayed at the government move to close the Press Club of Kashmir,” they said in a joint statement of DUJ.
The DUJ has termed it “singularly unfortunate”, that a division seems to have been created within journalists, with a small faction ‘taking over’ the Club on Saturday January 15, 2022, when Srinagar was under a lockdown, with the police and paramilitary personnel deployed during the process. “Several associations of Kashmir journalists have signed a joint statement objecting to this ‘takeover’ of the premises,” the DUJ claimed. It also noted that several arrests, detentions and questioning of journalists in Kashmir continue unabated.
On January 5, 2022 Sajad Gul, a trainee journalist with Kashmir Walla, was arrested for fomenting anti-government feelings. Last year Salman Shah and Suhail Dar were arrested for ‘breach of peace’. Journalist Aasif Sultan has been in jail since August 27, 2018 and awaits trial.
“We call for greater democracy and freedom of the press in Kashmir today. We view the developments in the Kashmir Press Club as one more reprehensible attempt to intimidate journalists. We demand immediate restoration of the Club to the duly elected office bearers and a renewal of the license. There must be no government interference in the running of a journalists’ club,” the DUJ stated.
– global bihari bureau
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