Page 43 - Tehelka Issue 13 - July 15, 2018

media

House that publishes
English daily Rising The bygone year witnessed the
Kashmir, Urdu daily killing of 12 journalists namely
Buland Kashmir and Hari Prakash (January 2), Brajesh
Kashmiri daily Sangar- Kumar Singh (January 3), Shyam
mal. Hailed from Kreeri Sharma (May 15), Kamlesh Jain
locality in (May 31), Surender Singh Rana (
Baramulla district, July 29), Gauri Lankesh ( Septem-
Shujaat left behind his ber 5), Shantanu Bhowmik (Sep-
parents, wife and two tember 20), KJ Singh (September
minor children. He was 23), Rajesh Mishra (October 21),
laid to rest on June 14, Sudip Datta Bhaumik (November
the holy month of Ram- 21), Naveen Gupta (November 30)
zaan when everybody and Rajesh Sheoran (December
fasts, in his home place. 21) across India.
India’s troubled neigh- Among those casualties,
bour Pakistan lost journalist Anjum Northeast’s smallest state of Tripura reported two incidents of journo-mur-
Muneer Raja, who used to work in der within few weeks. Shantanu Bhowmik, a young television reporter was
Urdu daily Qaumi Pukaar to assail- stabbed to death during a protest demonstration at Mandai locality of west-
ants on March 1. Raja was shot dead by ern Tripura. On the other hand, Sudip Datta Bhaumik, who used to work for
the miscreants in Rawalpindi locality, a Bengali newspaper, was shot dead by a Tripura State Rifles constable at
while he was on his way to home in RK Nagar locality in the same area. Both the murders created a sensation
the late evening. The second case was in Northeast India and the then state chief minister Manik Sarkar received
reported on March 27, when Zeeshan widespread criticism from various quarters. The Communist chief minister
Ashraf Butt, a journalist from another had to digest another round of brickbats after the murder of three media
Urdu daily Nawa-i-Waqt, faced the employees (Sujit Bhattacharya, Ranjit Chowdhury and Balaram Ghosh) in
bullets. Butt was allegedly shot dead by Agartala during 2013.
Begowala Union Council Chairperson By now, Tripura has a Bhartiya Janata Party-led government and the
Imran Cheema. new chief minister Biplab Kumar Deb, following the saffron party’s poll
Bangladesh reported the murder promises, recently handed over the cases of Shantanu and Sudip to Central
of Bangladeshi blogger and activ- Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for further probes. Meanwhile, a young report-
ist Shahzahan Bachchu on June 11 at er, Suman Debnath, faced serious attacks at Dharmanagar locality on June
Munshiganj locality. Editor of weekly 18, but fortunately, he survived. While international media rights bodies
newspaper Amader Bikrampur, Bach- like RSF, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), International Federation of
chu was allegedly attacked by Islamist Journalists( IFJ), etc have raised voices for justice to all slain media persons,
forces for his free-thinking comments. the media fraternity in the Indian subcontinent continued pursuing for a
Various international rights bodies pragmatic action plan to safeguard the journalists in the line of military,
condemned the murder of Bachchu police and doctors on duty. They have put their arguments loud and clear
and urged the authority for the genu- that if the nations want the scribes to do the risky jobs for the greater inter-
ine probe to find the culprits. est, their security along with justice must be ensured.
According to various international
agencies, nearly 40 journalists lost
their lives to assailants till date this
year, where Afghanistan (casualty (146), Mexico (147), Russia (148), Singa- Indonesia (124), Maldives (120), Afghani-
11) tops the list. It is followed by India, pore (151), Turkey (157), Iraq (160), Egypt stan (118), Nepal (106), Bhutan (94), Israel
Yemen (3), Pakistan, Mexico, Palestine, (161), Iran (164), Laos (170), Cuba (172), (87), Hong Kong (70), Fiji (57), Mauritius
Philippines, United States of America, China (176), Syria (177), etc. (See box to (56), USA (45), South Korea (43), Taiwan
Ecuador (2 each), Bangladesh, Brazil, know the number of journalists killed in (42), United Kingdom (40), Ghana (23),
Nicaragua, Slovakia, Syria (1 each), etc. 2017) Norway and Sweden have main- Belgium (7), Switzerland (5), Netherlands
India is placed at 138 out of 180 tained their first two positions in the (3), etc.
countries in Reporters Without Bor- RSF press freedom index, where North
ders (Reporters Sans Frontières) 2018 Korea continues to be at the bottom of The author is a Guwahati based political
global press freedom index, followed the list. Countries which perform better commentator
by Pakistan (139), Thailand (140), Cam- than India include Myanmar (137), Phil-
bodia (142), Malaysia (145), Bangladesh ippines (133), Sri Lanka (131), Qatar (125), letters@tehelka.com

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