AAP trying to muzzle voice of media in Punjab: Sukhbir Badal
Darpan News Desk IANS, 26 May, 2023 10:13 AM
Chandigarh, May 26 (IANS) Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Badal on Friday accused the AAP government in Punjab of trying to muzzle the voice of media ever since it assumed power.
"The government has registered false cases against journalists besides banning web channels and even stopping advertisements to publications which refused to relay its propaganda," he said.
"It has also proceeded against artists, academicians and intellectuals. The SAD will do its utmost to guard the freedom of the press and democratic values and warns the AAP government not to trample upon civil rights in this manner."
Reacting to summoning of Managing Editor of the Ajit newspaper, Barjinder Singh Hamdard, Badal said the act of summoning of Hamdard by the state Vigilance Bureau was a "brazen act of a power drunk Chief Minister who wanted to exact revenge against the him for his principled stand on freedom of the press".
In a statement here, the SAD President expressed solidarity with Hamdard and said the Akali Dal would do its utmost to defend the voice of the media in Punjab.
Asserting that the intimidation of Hamdard had shocked Punjabis worldwide, Badal said the Chief Minister first stopped advertisements to the Ajit newspaper. "Then it started intimidating functionaries of the Ajit and now it has stooped down to persecuting its Managing Director. This is the height of vendetta politics and is totally unacceptable in a democracy."
The latest arrestee, identified as Abdul alias Raja, was found involved in allegedly orchestrating violence and also provoking the crowd to resort to stone pelting during the Hanuman Jayanti procession.
Addressing a high-level meeting here, the Chief Minister categorically said in case any incident of drug supply comes to his notice from any part of the state, then the concerned Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) or the Commissioner of Police (CP) would be held solely accountable.
Police sources said that the accident took place at Khandli in Rajouri, when a bus coming from Peeri to Rajouri collided with a tipper coming from the opposite direction.
Deputy Commissioner of Police, Usha Rangnani, said a PCR call was received at 6.15 a.m. on Wednesday at the Mahendra Park police station, in which the caller, Shiv Kumar, reported shattering of window panes of vehicles by some Muslim boys.
Addressing a gathering here to hand over appointment letters to 2,373 youths after launching a massive recruitment drive to fill 26,754 posts, he wished that such functions - to give appointment letters to the youths - should be held regularly.
As many as 60 members of search teams carried out the extensive search on Tuesday in some 40 km in which a shocking fact came to the fore that in order to distill the illicit liquor from 'lahan', the water used was the one which came from the sewage of industrial units of Ludhiana city.
