K’taka BJP leader demands Press Council to stand up to Jamaat
New Delhi/Bengaluru, April 8 (IANS) After a member of Tablighi Jamaat decided to intimidate media outlets for carrying a factual news report by IANS, support is pouring in from all across India.
Now, Karnataka BJP spokesperson G. Madhusudhana has hailed the investigation on the Tablighi Jamaat by IANS, calling the intimidation tactics an attack on freedom of press.
Madhusudhana has called upon the Press Council of India (PCI) to step in to safeguard the rights of free press.
“This is an investigative report and this is the right of a journalist to safeguard the interests of the country,” said the Karnataka BJP leader.
Acknowledging the effort by IANS to bring out the truth, Madhusudhana said, “This investigative report was only a harbinger of the national interest, nothing personal against any person or organisation.”
India’s largest independent news agency, Indo-Asian News Service (IANS), on Wednesday sent a legal notice to a member of the Tablighi Jamaat after he attempted to selectively harass and criminally intimidate the agency’s media subscribers for running an IANS exclusive report on the Islamic missionary’s dubious background on their digital editions.
Represented by Hammurabi & Solomon Partners, IANS in its counter notice called out the Bengaluru based Tablighi Jamaati’s “malafide and deliberate attempt to intimidate” its subscribers and “attempt to misuse the due process of law.”
Earlier, BJP’s economic wing Chief Gopal Krishna Agarwal too hailed the investigation saying, “The news report by IANS is based on facts. From its very inception, Tabhlighi Jamaat has been under the cloud of suspension. By resorting to such acts, they are simply exposing them and their organisation.”
Surendra Jain, Joint General Secretary of VHP, also called out the organisation’s terror links while Delhi BJP leader Aswini Upadhyay took to twitter to call it a matter of the pot calling the kettle black.
He demanded that the National Investigative Agency (NIA), which is entrusted with probing all terror related cases in India, should investigate the Tablighi Jamaat.
BJP’s IT Cell head Amit Malviya too called it a brazen act of attack on freedom of press. Malviya tweeted: “Sending legal notices to media for stating what isn’t a secret among security establishments and analysts worldwide. TJ’s boorish behaviour and attempts to intimidate begs the question – why is no one speaking for media’s freedom, including the ‘usual suspects’ in media?”
IANS has decided to stand by its legacy of fearless journalism and not take this criminal intimidation by the dubious Jamaat member lying down. The overwhelming support pouring in from different quarters only strengthens its stand.
–IANS
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