New Delhi: Several media associations on Sunday condemned the arrest of a journalist, the editor and the head of a television channel over alleged objectionable content related to UP CM Yogi Adityanath, describing the police action as an "authoritarian misuse of laws" and an effort to intimidate the press.
"As media-persons, it is our firm belief that journalists ought to conduct themselves responsibly, yet at the same time, we feel that criminal provisions of the defamation law should be taken off the statute books, given their repeated use against journalists and others," said a statement collectively signed by the Indian Women's Press Corps, Press Club of India, South Asian Women in the Media and Press Association. The Editors Guild of India also condemned the UP's police action.
Journalist Prashant Kanojia had shared a video where a woman is seen speaking to reporters outside the CM office claiming that she had sent a marriage proposal to the CM.
