New Delhi: The Assam police detained a senior digital media journalist, Dilwar Hussain Mozumder, in Guwahati this afternoon after he tried to pose questions at the managing director of a cooperative bank related to allegations of a multi-crore recruitment scam.
While chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma is the bank’s director, its chairman is BJP MLA Biswajit Phukan.
On the afternoon of March 25, Mozumder, chief reporter with the digital media outfit The CrossCurrent, had reached the premises of the Assam Co-operative Apex Bank, located in the city’s Pan Bazar area, to cover a protest against the alleged scam.
The protest was being held by Jatiya Yuva Sakti, a sister organisation of the Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) regional party.
Amidst slogan-shouting by the protesters, the bank’s managing director Dambaru Saikia, who is seen as close to the chief minister, arrived at the spot.
A video clip broadcast by The CrossCurrent on its YouTube channel showed Mozumder turning his attention towards Saikia and asking him on camera to stop for a minute so that he could ask him a few questions about the allegations.
In the video clip, Saikia could clearly be heard asking Mozumder to instead come upstairs to his office.
Arup Kalita, editor of The CrossCurrent, told The Wire: “Strangely, as he was leaving the bank, Mozumder got a call from the Pan Bazar police station, asking him to report at once. Upon reaching there, he was detained.”
Kalita said, “It has been over six hours now; neither is the police allowing us to meet him, nor are we told exactly on what charges has he been booked.”
Gauhati high court lawyer Aman Wadud told The Wire, “I, as his lawyer, stood outside the Pan Bazar police station for nearly three hours but was not allowed to meet Mozumder.”
A Facebook post put out by Mozumder, who is also assistant general secretary of the Guwahati Press Club, said he was detained by the state police for asking questions to Saikia about the alleged scam.
An intrepid reporter, Mozumder has been following up the allegations against the bank and had produced a couple of news reports on it prior to covering the protest.
Reacting to the police action, AJP president Lurinjyoti Gogoi said in a statement that detaining a journalist on duty is not acceptable in a democracy.
“Hussain went to seek the MD’s response. What crime has he done?” Gogoi asked, adding that such acts are an attempt by the chief minister to unleash “Jungle Raj” in Assam.
Assam Pradesh Congress Committee media department chairman Bedabrat Borah condemned the act, saying, “the freedom of press and freedom of journalists have been attacked”.
