Free Speech Should Be "Protected": Press Club Of India Sends Letter To President Of India (image @ pixabay)
The Press Club of India has issued a letter to the President of India to draw the Presidents “attention to the unprecedented situation faced by the independent media in India today”. The letter said that the journalists in India take a lot of “collective pride” in what India has achieved in the last 75 years but reminded about the dark period “when the Fourth Estate was fettered”, a phase which the Indian democracy may not like to be repeated.
Journalist bodies write to the @rashtrapatibhvn, requesting her intervention as the highest Constitutional authority to ensure that the freedoms in our Constitution are protected which includes the freedom of speech, the freedom to profess occupation and livelihood pic.twitter.com/pVZVTvrrWu
— Press Club of India (@PCITweets) October 16, 2023
The letter says that the journalist community face a “more insidious challenge” due to the draconian law being imposed on the journalists without even acknowledging the special role of the independent press, which is “being the voice of so many diverse citizens of this country”.
The letter complains about the “unfettered rights” the draconian law continues to practice by seizing the equipment and software, which contains the source of the news and therefore “livelihood” of the journalist community. The letter also complains about how the “laws do not provide for bail where incarceration is the norm and not the exception”.
In the letter, the Press Club of India remind the President of India that for a democracy to thrive, “the media must be free” and asked the President’s intervention as the “highest Constitutional authority” of the country that have the power to ensure the freedoms in the Constitution like freedom of speech and the freedom to profess occupation and livelihood are “protected”.
According to free speech collective, from the year 2010 to 2020, the total number of journalists who were arrested, interrogated and served show-cause notices were 154 with over 40 percentage of such scenarios unfolding in 2020. And nine foreign journalists faced interrogations, arrest, deportation and denial of entry to the country. According to studies, over 30 journalists in India died and 198 cases of physical attacks on journalist were reported, majority of which has been done in 2014 to 2019. 36 of the cases was done in 2019 alone.
In 2020 three journalists were murdered. Shubham Mani Tripathi was shot by an unknown person in Uttar Pradesh. The attack was alleged to be adhered to the sand mining case in the area. Israel Moses was murdered by alleged drug dealers on November 8. Rakesh Singh died as his house was set fire.
