Justice in India: UP Police Files FIR Against Scroll Journalist For Report On Modi's Adopted Village // Four Months After Viral Video Of Policemen Beating Man To Death, FIR Says No Suspects
Reporters Without Borders, an international outfit which tracks the status of press freedom worldwide, condemned the FIR calling it an “attempt to intimidate one of India’s most resilient reporter”. The Committee to Protect Journalists, another international organisation that works on press freedom, also condemned the FIR against Sharma.
The FIR against Sharma is only the most recent instance of a journalist being targeted by a government. According to a recent report titled ‘India: Media’s Crackdown during COVID-19 Lockdown’ prepared by the ‘Rights and Risks Analysis Group’, at least 55 journalists were targeted in different ways during the ongoing coronavirus lockdown, with the state of Uttar Pradesh targeting the highest number of journalists (11). Before Sharma, the Uttar Pradesh police recently grabbed headlines for registering an FIR against Siddharth Varadarajan, co-founder of online news portal The Wire.
Four Months After Viral Video Of Policemen Beating Man To Death, FIR Says No Suspects
The FIR against Sharma is only the most recent instance of a journalist being targeted by a government. According to a recent report titled ‘India: Media’s Crackdown during COVID-19 Lockdown’ prepared by the ‘Rights and Risks Analysis Group’, at least 55 journalists were targeted in different ways during the ongoing coronavirus lockdown, with the state of Uttar Pradesh targeting the highest number of journalists (11). Before Sharma, the Uttar Pradesh police recently grabbed headlines for registering an FIR against Siddharth Varadarajan, co-founder of online news portal The Wire.
The Uttar Pradesh
police have filed an First Information Report (FIR) against award winning
journalist Supriya Sharma, who is presently the Executive Editor of Scroll.in,
as well as the ‘Main Chief Editor’ of the same publication. The FIR has been filed
in connection with a news report written by Sharma, who has twice won the
Ramnath Goenka award, on Scroll.in about the impact of the coronavirus lockdown
on residents of the Domriya village, which was adopted by Prime Minister
Narendra Modi in 2018.
The Ramnagar Police
station officials in Varanasi district registered the FIR on the basis of a
complaint by Mala Devi (28), a resident of the Domria village, who was quoted
as saying in the Scroll.in report that she and her kids survived on tea and roti
during the lockdown period as her employers stopped paying. The police officials
have imposed charges under section 3 of The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled
Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Act 2015, often referred to as the
Atrocities act, and Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 269 and 501 in the
FIR. While the charges
under section 3 of the Atrocities act refer to at least two punishable offences
defined under the law and the IPC sections relate with publishing matter that
is ‘known to be defamatory’ (IPC 501) and a negligent action that is “likely to
spread infection of disease dangerous to life” (IPC 269).... read more:Four Months After Viral Video Of Policemen Beating Man To Death, FIR Says No Suspects
The Delhi
Police’s First Information Report into one the most controversial deaths in
the 2020 Delhi Riots omits any reference to the police’s alleged role in the
incident. 23-year-old Faizan
died in February this year, days after he was violently assaulted by uniformed
policemen and forced to sing the national anthem. A video of the
incident sparked outrage after it went viral online and was also carried by
several news outlets.
Yet the First
Information Report registered by the Bhajanpura Police station makes no mention
of the clearly documented video footage of the police assaulting Faizan;
contradicts on-record police statements that Faizan was in police custody
following his assault, and claims that Faizan died after he went missing from
the Guru Tegh Bahadur hospital in northeast Delhi. Three months and a
half months after his death, Faizan’s family is yet to get a copy of the
autopsy conducted on his corpse. Key witnesses in the case
told HuffPost India that police officers were putting pressure
on them to change their statements....
see also
India: End
Bias in Prosecuting Delhi Violence
Aseemanand's files disappear
No one is guilty for these violent crimes:
Samjhauta,
Malegaon,
Haren Pandya murder
Judge Loya's death
Convenient death of 3 of his friends,
Not to mention CJI Gogoi's sexual harrassment case
Failure to investigate ex CM Kalikho Pul's suicide
Safoora Zargar's arrest
No one is guilty for these violent crimes:
Samjhauta,
Malegaon,
Haren Pandya murder
Judge Loya's death
Convenient death of 3 of his friends,
Not to mention CJI Gogoi's sexual harrassment case
Failure to investigate ex CM Kalikho Pul's suicide
Safoora Zargar's arrest
