PRESS STATEMENT

June 17th, 2021

The Editors Guild of India condemns the filing of First Information Reports (FIRs) by the
Uttar Pradesh Police against The Wire and several other journalists, for their tweets on an
assault on an elderly Muslim man in Ghaziabad on June 5th. In the video that was posted by
those charged, the man is seen alleging that he was beaten up by some people and was forced
him to chant ‘ Jai Shree Ram’.

Several media organizations and journalists, besides the ones charged by the police, posted
this video on their social media feeds. Subsequently there was an alternate version offered by
the UP Police claiming that the assault was borne out of a dispute regarding a talisman that
the elderly man had sold to some people, which was also reported by these media
organizations and journalists.

The Guild is deeply concerned by the UP Police’s track record of filing FIRs against
journalists to deter them from reporting serious incidents without fear of reprisals. It is the
duty of the journalists to report on the basis of sources and in case facts become contested
later on, to report the emerging versions and facets. For police to wade into such professional
calls by journalists and attribute criminality to their actions is destructive of freedom of
speech, which is constitutionally protected and is an entrenched feature of the rule of law.

Further, it is quite evident that the police has been discriminatory in targeting those media
organizations and journalists- when thousands had tweeted the video- that have been critical
of the government and it’s policies. The Guild condemns this wanton misuse of laws to
criminalize reporting and dissent to harass independent media and demands that the FIRs be
withdrawn immediately.

Seema Mustafa Sanjay Kapoor Anant Nath

President General Secretary Treasurer

Address: 4/7- A, INS Building, Rafi Marg, New Delhi-110001