The assault of a journalist by the police in Assam last week has been condemned by journalists both in the state as well as abroad.
The Paris-based press freedom organisation Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) said in a statement, "It is shocking that reporters are beaten up just for doing their job. We demand that those responsible be punished."
The Journalists Action Committee (JAC) of Assam Saturday decided to boycott government functions and government-related news stories for two days beginning Sunday. "No news relating to the government will be published in any of the newspapers in Assam published on Monday and Tuesday," JAC member Sanjiv Phukan told Indo-Asian News Service (IANS). The meeting also decided to take out protest rallies across Assam on Tuesday to condemn the incident.
Robin Dhekial Phukan, a correspondent with Asomiya Pratidin daily, was seriously injured Friday when policemen assaulted him while trying to disperse protestors at Kakopathar, the scene of violent clashes that left nine people dead. Phukan had gone to the area to cover a visit by Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi. The journalist was apparently not spared even after he showed his identity card. Phukan was seriously injured and was later admitted to Assam Medical College and Hospital (AMCH) in Dibrugarh.
The Chief Minister Saturday told reporters the assaulted journalist was more an activist than a scribe. "I don't approve of journalists being attacked, but this journalist was instigating the crowd," Gogoi claimed. The previous day minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who also happened to be in Kakopathar when Phukan was injured, described him as "a teacher who claims to be a journalist whenever he indulges in unlawful activities."
The attack on Phukan came the same day when three major news television channels of the country, Zee News, Star News and Aaj Tak, were blacked out by cable operators in the state for failing to cover properly the February 10 Kakopathar carnage and its follow-up that has plunged the state into turmoil.
Nine people were killed and several others injured when panicky policemen fired on a crowd of almost 20,000 protestors who were demonstrating against the death of suspected ULFA linkman Ajit Mohanta in Army custody. The state came to a grinding halt on February 13 and 14 in response to back-to-back bandhs called in protest by the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and the All-Assam Students Union (AASU).
According to the Assam Tribune, the Press Clubs in Doom Dooma, Tinsukia, Jorhat, Sivasagar, Moran, Tingkhong and Sonari have condemned the police brutality and called for an apology from the state government. At Sonari, protesters blocked railway tracks for several hours affecting train services on the Guwahati-Dibrugarh route. Newspaper reporters in Tinsukia and Doom Dooma have decided to boycott government and Congress party functions until an apology on the assault is issued.
The attack on a journalist and the subsequent boycott of government functions by journalist comes as more bad news for Chief Minister Gogoi who has been at the receiving end from one and all since the Kakopathar incident. According to the Telegraph, Gogoi was forced to beat a hasty retreat from the AMCH in the face of a barrage of protests from relatives of those injured in the firing. "First your forces torture and fire at us and then you find time after a week to come and shed crocodile tears," a family member of an injured person, still recuperating in the hospital, shouted.
The state government Saturday, more than a week after it happened, instituted a judicial inquiry into the Kakopathar incident to be headed by retired Supreme Court judge KN Saikia. Saikia will submit a report in the "shortest possible time." Gogoi put on a brave face, "We cannot allow violation of human rights whether by the Army or by any other forces. The guilty will not be spared."
