Tripura Scribes Write To PM, HM About Attacks On Media & CM’s ‘Threat’

Agartala: The Tripura Assembly of Journalists (TAJ) has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and Press Council of India (PCI) bringing to their notice the attack on six journalists in the state.

The TAJ, which claimed that Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb’s controversial statements on the media last month had triggered the attacks, has written that there’s been no progress in the investigation into assault of six journalists, despite several complaints.

“The media in the state has been through a very dark phase of poor governance; it was targeted as the enemy of the state. Even during the Emergency in the ’70s, the media didn’t face such a demoralizing situation. The attack on journalists and the creation of undue pressure on the media are completely undemocratic,” TAJ convener Sekhar Dutta and chairman Subal Kumar Dey stated in a press statement released on Wednesday.

CM Deb, at the inaugural ceremony of Tripura’s first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) at Sabroom in the state’s south district on September 11, had said that some “overexcited newspapers are trying to confuse people over COVID-19″ pandemic and he would not forgive them.

TAJ, in its letter, claimed that the “unwarranted and unexpected threat” and “use of muscle power to gag the press” were followed by attacks on journalists who refused to “toe the line of Biplab Kumar Deb-led government.”