Editors Guild, Press Club, CPJ Condemn ED Raids on NewsClick Office, Editors’ Residences

New Delhi: As ED raids continued for over 30 hours at news portal NewsClick’s office and its Editor-in-Chief Prabir Purkayastha's house, statements of solidarity continued to pour in support of the body of work that the portal has been doing in giving a voice to the poor and vulnerable and protests and movements that have dropped off the radar of mainstream media.

The Editors Guild of India (EGI) , in a statement issued on Wednesday, said it was “deeply concerned” about the raids by the ED at the office of the independent news website newsclick.in, the residences of its editor-in-chief and promoter, the editor, as well as some of its senior management officials.

“In the recent past the website has been at the frontline of reporting on the farmers agitation, the anti-CAA protests, and has been critical of various government policies and of a few powerful corporates house”, it noted adding that the it was concerned that “raids by government agencies are not used as coercive measures to suppress free and independent journalism.”

The EGI demanded that care be taken to not undermine the news operations of Newsclick and that its journalists and stakeholders were not harassed under the garb of such measures.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) Asia chapter also tweeted on Tuesday: “We are concerned by news reports that the Indian government’s Enforcement Directorate raided the office of @newsclick.in today. We urge the authorities to respect press freedom.”

The Press Club of India (PCI), in a statement issued on Wednesday termed the ED raids as “an unsavoury attack on the media in a bid to intimidate and silence critical journalism.”

“This particular news group has closely covered the ongoing farmers protest, and specialises in reports on government policies on the poorer sections of society. Publicising the charge of alleged money laundering against a small, public-spirited, news company is no way to defend democratic values and institutions, which the government proclaims to be doing, especially on the world stage,” said the statement signed by senior journalists Anand K Sahay (president) and Anant Bagaitkar (secretary).

Expressing concern over attacks on “prominent journalists of the country, and also on lesser known hard working journalists who report from the ground in far-flung areas of the country,” the PCI noted that this had “regrettably become the hallmark of the government.”

“In the past one year, numerous FIRs have been registered against journalists on the plainly specious and false charge of sedition and incitement of communal disharmony,” said PCI, adding that it has “seen it as a duty to record its protest in all such matters.”

PCI also noted that in several such cases, vile allegations have been made against journalists and “boutique journalist groups” doing ground-level work to expose communal agendas and poor people issues, which do not eventually “make headway in terms of investigations. Nor have they withstood judicial scrutiny.”

Noting that all this ends up giving the government “a bad name”, the PCI urged the government to end “raid raj and false allegations raj” against the media and take visible steps to ensure free speech and right to liberty.

On Tuesday, Digipub, a conglomerate of digital news only websites (Newsclick is part of it) and Delhi Union of Journalists also issued a statement condemning the ED raids.

Wider support

Individuals, including many contributors, viewers and readers of NewClick also tweeted in solidarity, recognising the body of its work in the field of people’s movements, science and technology, data journalism etc.

In a statement, BKU Ekta Ugrahan condemned the raids on the news portal’s office, which has been “reporting extensively on the farmers agitation for the past two months”.

Noting that NewsClick has “established itself as a different voice with news & analysis of national and international affairs,”  BKU Ekta Ugrahan also  pointed out that the portal has been “providing a platform to leading investigative journalists like Paranjoy Guha Thakurta and bold video journalists Abhisar Sharma & P Sainath among others.”

“Our organisation strongly condemns these raids as a serious attack on the online media and freedom of Press. Considers it a continuation of repressive measures adopted against several senior journalists last week by filing sedition changes against them and also curbing free speech on twitter and You Tube. Our organisation demands stopping such raids and other repressive activities immediately” said the statement issued by Sukhdev Singh Kokri Kalan, General Secretary of  one of the biggest farmer unions in Punjab.

In view of the growing attacks on media, especially independent media and individual journalists, media organisations too came out with solidarity statements.

Tejal Kanitkar, a scientist and climate expert, who is a columnist for the news portal tweeted: “Go to @newsclickin homepage. The first three stories that show up are about 1)The farmers agitation 2) Sanitation workers 3) App-based workers. Which other news portal consistently tells stories of working masses? Now you know what the raid is about.”

Noting the ED action as a “blatant attempt to intimidate and suppress an independent news portal,” a statement by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) also condemned “yet another attack on independent media”

“NewsClick has been providing credible and wide coverage of the farmers protests,” it said, adding that the “Central agencies are being used by the Modi government to harass and silence independent media.”

The National Secretariat of the Communist Party of India, deploring the “dangerous trend which undermines democracy and freedom of press”, has condemned the attack on media and media persons and the growing trend of using government agencies to harass them as well as to raid the offices and houses of journalists.

Several writers, artistes, academics, film-makers and individuals have also deplored the ED raids on Newsclick’s office as also the recent attacks on senior journalists.

“We strongly deplore the raids by the Enforcement Directorate on the independent online news portal, NEWSCLICK. This is in continuation of the attacks on journalists and media persons, including Mrinal Pande, Rajdeep Sardesai, Zafar Agha, Siddharth Varadarajan, Mandeep Punia, Vinod Jose, Aman Nath, Paresh Nath and others, who have been vocal in their support of the farmers’ agitation” said the statement signed by the following: 

 In solidarity,

 A N DAMODARAN, janasamskriti 

A.G.K. Menon, architect/urban planner

Aban Raza, artist

Abhilasha Kumari,  former director, KIIT University, professor, communication ISID,

Achin Vanaik, retd. professor, Delhi University

Aditi Chowdhury, citizen

Aditya Mukherjee, professor retd., JNU

AGK Menon, architect/urban planner

Ajay K. Mehra, Atal Bihari Vajpayee Senior Fellow, NMML

Ajith Pillai, independent journalist

Albeena Shakeel, former president, JNUSU

Amitabha Pande,  IAS retd, former secretary, Government of India.

Amitava Das, artist

Amitava Sanyal, journalist

Anil Bhatti, professor emeritus, JNU

Anil Chandra, activist

Anisha Shekhar Mukherjee, conservation architect and writer

Anita Rampal, educationist

Anuradha Kapur, theatre worker

Archana Prasad, JNU

Aruna Roy & Nikhil Dey, MKSS

Avinash Kumar, assistant professor, JNU

Ayesha Kidwai, JNU

Baankaahi

Badri Raina, author, columnist

Basanta, editor, Tulika Books

Bishnupriya Dutt, JNU

Dhanu Swadi, concerned citizen

Dinesh Abrol, retd scientist, CSIR

Estell Desai, activist

Gautam Mody, general secretary, New Trade Union Initiative

Geeta Kapur, independent art critic and curator

Gigi Scaria, artist

Harsh Mandar, activist, writer

Indira Chandrasekhar, publisher

Indranil Chowdhury, assistant professor, Delhi University

Irfan Habib, professor emeritus, AMU

Jahar Kanungo, filmmaker, writer

Karuna D.W., assistant professor, Azim Premji University

Kausar Wizarat, former assistant professor, NIEPA

Kumar Shahani, independent film maker

Latika Gupta

Lima Kanungo, retd teacher, DU

Lt Col Anuj Srivastava, retd.

M.G. Devasahayam, chairman, People-First

M.K. Raina, actor, theatre director

Madan Gopal Singh, writer, singer

Madhu Prasad, retd. teacher, Delhi University

Madhusree Dutta, filmmaker, curator

Maitrayee Chaudhuri, professor, JNU

Mandira Sen, Director, Stree, Samya

Manini Chatterjee, journalist and author

Maya Krishna Rao, theatre artist

Meera Sanghamitra, National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) 

MG Devasahayam

Mohan Rao, retd. professor, JNU

Moushumi Basu, JNU

Mridula Mukherjee, professor retd., JNU

N.D.Jayaprakash, social worker

N.K. Sharma, theatre director

Nancy Adajania, cultural theorist and curator, Bombay 

Nasir Tyabji,former director, professor, Jamia Millia Islamia

Narayani Gupta, retd. professor, JMI

Navsharan Singh

P. Sainath, journalist

P.K. Shukla, former secretary, ICHR

Padma Velaskar, retd. professor, TISS (Mumbai)

Pamela Philipose, independent journalist

Parthiv Shah, designer, photographer

Prabhat Patnaik, professor emeritus, JNU

Pradip Kumar Datta, retired professor

Puneet Nicholas Yadav, journalist

Pushpamala N, artist

R. Ramakumar

Rajendra Sharma, writer, activist

Rajinder Arora, writer, designer, publisher

Raka Chakravarty, architect

Ram Rahman, designer, photographer

Ramesh Dixit, retd. professor, Lucknow University

Ras Bihari Das, retd., IRTS

Rashmi Doraiswamy, professeer, Jamia Millia Islamia

Rimli Bhattacharya, writer, teacher & translator, University of Delhi

Ritu Menon, publisher     

S.N.Sahu

Saeed Mirza, writer, filmmaker

Saif Mahmood, advocate, Supreme Court of India

Sarita Sabiruddin 

Shabnam Hashmi, Anhad 

Sharmila Samant, artist 

Sherna Dastur, designer

Shireen Moosvi, retd professor, AMU

Smita Gupta, independent economist

Sohail Hashmi, writer, filmmaker

Sucheta Mahajan, professor,JNU

Sudhir Chandra, retd, professor

Tejal Kanitkar, associate professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies

Utsa Patnaik, professor emerita, JNU

Valay Singh, writer, journalist 

Vivan Sundaram, artist

Zoya Hasan, retd. professor, JNU

Several people in Kolkata have condemned the ED raids on Newsclick that were still going on till late night.

Bikashranjan Bhattacharya, Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament and President of All India lawyers Union said the “autocratic facade of Modi Government is gradually showing its face... The regime is terrorising voices of dissent in the country.”

He pointed out that while money laundering cases like Narada and Sarada have not been effectively investigated, the alleged plea of money laundering leading to the raid in the office of Newsclick shows “vengeance” directed towards independent media which are exposing the “true face” of the Modi regime.

It may be recalled that it was Bhattacharya who had lodged and advocated the case that exposed the Sarada and Narada scams in West Bengal.

The Calcutta Journalist Club also criticised the raids saying it was a ‘danger to democracy”. “It is an ominous sign for the country  and the media fraternity as a whole,” said  Calcutta Journalist Club secretary Rahul Goswami  in a press release.

Jibananda Basu, a senior scribe and publisher of Bartaman newspaper, the second largest media house in Kolkata, said it was unfortunate if Newsclick was being hounded up for standing by the side of farmers’ protests, adding that democracy and journalism cannot be muzzled.

Talking to Newsclick, linguist Pabitra Sarkar saw this move as a sign of the advent of fascism.