GG News Bureau
New Delhi, 5th Sept. The Indian Women’s Press Corps expresses deep concern at the registration of a FIR against the President, Editors Guild of India and three members of a fact-finding team that visited Manipur.
A three-member team of the EGI had visited Manipur to report on the media’s reportage of the ethnic clashes in the state which claimed more than 150 lives and displaced thousands of people.
The FIR which was filed on the basis of a complaint by a social worker lists a range of offences including 66 A of the IT Act which was declared as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court eight years ago. One of the offences relates to the publication of an erroneous caption which was rectified by the authors of the report. Chief Minister Biren Singh held a press conference to accuse the EGI of “trying to instigate more clashes.
The FIR includes as many as eleven sections of the IPC including all major IPC offences listed by the complainant, all of which are punishable by imprisonment.
It is to be noted that EGI expressed regret for the error and also rectified an erroneous caption in its report, which seems to have been the immediate basis for the complaint and FIR.
The EGI is a 45-year-old non-profit institution aimed to protect press freedom and raise the standards of editorial leadership. It is among the leading apex and independent bodies in the media that stand for press freedom. Many of its founding stalwarts were those who stood against the Emergency. The EGI has consistently stood for the rights of the media. The registration of a FIR against such a body ill behoves the largest democracy in the world.
The IWPC demands and urges the Manipur government to quash the charges more so when the erroneous caption has been removed from the report.
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