Summary Report
For the first time in India, a two days national convention was held in New Delhi’s Constitution Club on the attack on journalists, in which journalists from 18 states participated and shared their trauma. This convention was held in the format of a public tribunal where the testimonies of journalists having faced attacks and the family members of those killed were put forth.
The convention against the attacks on journalists was organized by the ‘Committee against Attack on Journalists (CAAJ)’ with the active cooperation of the Press Club of India and was supportedby international organization, the ‘Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). CAAJ comprises 34 constituent groups of media and civil society organizations. Basic theme of the convention was to address the shrinking space of dissent and right to expression and the need of coming together of journalists and the civil society organizations. The attacks on the right to dissent and right to expression affects the journalists and the social activists alike, hence the need of the hour is that all the affected parties must come together on a common platform and fight for each other’s rights and the interests.
The idea of a national convention was conceived after the murder of the Kashmiri journalists Sujat Bukhari and initiatives were taken to form a Committee against the attacks on the journalists. The invitations were sent to independent media groups and civil society organizations were sent by the website Media Vigil.com. The 2 month long process of preparation for the convention was two faceted – the formal formation of the committee and secondly the documentation of the incidents of attacks on journalists during the last eight years. After documentation of the incidents the journalists having faced attacks and the family members of the killed were contacted and thus gradually a blue-print of the convention got prepared. As the convention was to be centered on the attacks on journalists and in the process of contacting journalists, various forms of attacks came to light; all the efforts were made to ensure the inclusion of all kinds of attacks. After due deliberations, the attacks were placed in four categories: 1. Murder and the physical attacks; 2. Trolling and threats; 3. Misuse of government machinery; fake cases and defamation suits; and 4. Surveillances and censorship. Keeping these categories in mind, 4 sessions was worked out on each of the categories of the attacks, besides the inaugural and conclusion sessions.
The convention was inaugurated with the keynote addresses by the film actor Prakash Raj and veteran journalist Lalit Surjan. The inaugural session was presided over by senior journalist and writer, Ananad Swaroop Vema. The actor Prakash Raj was invited for delivering on of the keynote addresses for his stand against the murder of Gauri Lankesh and for his stand on right to expression on various forums. Lalit Suranjan is one of the few editors, who have been consistently and fearlessly writing on attacks on journalists and freedom to expression in Chhattisgarh. Both the speakers detailed the existing conditions that were summarized by Anand Swaroop Verma in his presidential address. Also the India correspondent of CPJ, Kunal Mazumdar read out the CPJ’s message of solidarity with and support to the convention, in this session. Over 400 journalists and activists had registered for the session that was pervasively covered in social and digital media.
After the inauguration, the first formal session on attacks was quite emotive. In this session some cases of murders were brought forth, where the family members of assassinated journalists vividly described their agonies and resolve to fight. The testimonies of the mother of Uttarakhand journalist Devendra Patwa Ganga Devi; AshaRanjan, the wife of Bihar journalist Rajdev Ranjan, were quite distressing. These three were killed while on work. None of the families have got justice. The case of the murder of Sandip sharma in Bhind, Madhya Pradesh was presented by the executive editor of Media Vigil.Com, Abhishek Shrivastav who had gone to meet the family of deceased in Indore. In fact, Sharma’s case was to be presented by his journalist friend Vikas Purohit from Bhopal, who could notcome for unavoidable reasons. Dr. Santosh Gupta of Indian Federation of working Journalists, came from Moradabad to present the cases of five journalists killed in UP. The session was presided over by Sanjay parikh, senior advocate in Supreme Court of India.
The session continued after the lunch break. Gulf News, reporter Jalil Rathore from Kashmir and the editor of Shillong Times, Patricia Mukhim talked about the dangers looming large on journalism and the journalists in their respective regions. This year the house of Patricia was attacked by the petrol bomb. She had reported about the illegal mining that angered the mining mafia. Kunal Mazumdar, who recently visited Kashmir, presented the CPJ report about the risks faced by journalists there.
The second session was on trolling and threats. Ravish Kumar, Nehe Dixit and NiKhil Vagle addressed this session and described their plights in detail. The session was presided by NiKhil Vagle.
The rain delayed the second day’s proceedings by half an hour. The first session of was focused on fake cases and defamation notices. Over a dozen journalists presented their cases. Largest participation in this session was from Chhattisgarh from where journalists Kamal Shukla; Avesh Tiwari; Prabhat Singh and Santosh came to participate and put forth their cases and the precarious conditions prevailing there. Rachna Khaira from Punjab; Salim Baig and Shiv Das from UP; Pushyamitra from Bihar; vinod Kumar from Jharkhand and Shahina KK from Kerala, presented their respective cases. It is to be noted that all of them have some cases registered against them and most of them are on bail. Vinod Kumar is facing the case of sedition for his Facebook posts. All of them described the dangers and risks of journalism in towns and small cities and underlined the differences of state of journalism there from that in Delhi. National secretary of Indian Federation of working Journalists, Siddharth Kalhans told the gathering the details of his organization’s attempts and programs for the protection of journalists. Siddharth Vardrajan, editor of the Wire was also scheduled to address this session but could not reach for some reasons. This session was presided by Sumit Chakraborti, editor, Mainstream.
The topic of the second session of the second day was survilance and censorship. Punya Prasoon Vajpeyi, who had to resign from ABP news under governmental pressure recently. Others who shared their views and experiences were Om Thanvi, consultant editor of Rajsthan Patrika; Vetran journalist, Joshi Joseph; Shiv Inder Singh, editor of Suhi Suber who also works for Canada Radio from Punjab; Manoj Kumar Singh editor of Gorsakhpur Newsline; and seemaazad, editor of Dastak from Allahabad. Seema has served jail sentence under UAPA. This session was preided by Hartosh Singh Bal, political editor of Carvan.
The concluding session of the convention was scheduled for the presentation of summaries of the previous four sessions. The moderators of four sessions including the inaugural session, Pamela Philipos; Atal Tiwari; Nityanand Gayen; Anusha Pauland, Richa Pandey presented the summaries of their respective sessions. At the end of it Anand Swaroop read the resolution of the convention. The convention resolved to entrust the organizers with the responsibility of expansion of CAAJ and its future prospective programs. The resolution was unanimously passed. This session was presided by Anil Chaudhary.