The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Journalists take out massive rally

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Friday, Jun 27, 2008
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Journalists take out massive rally

Special Correspondent

-Photo: Mohd. Yousuf

One voice: Opposition leaders and journalists at a rally in city on Thursday protesting the arrest of the ‘Andhra Jyothi’ editor.

HYDERABAD: Continuing their protest against the arrest and imprisonment of Andhra Jyothi editor K. Srinivas and two of its reporters, journalists and leaders of opposition parties took out a rally in the city on Thursday demanding unconditional release of the scribes.

The agitated members raised slogans against the government for “targeting” the media that was writing reports against its functioning and staged ‘rasta roko’ disrupting traffic on the busy Basheerbagh road for some time. Senior leaders of the Left parties, TDP, BJP, Telangana Rashtra Samiti and Lok Satta besides representatives of voluntary organisations like Progressive Organisation for Women participated in the protest.

Representatives of the Congress and the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen were, however, not present. The rally that started from the Andhra Pradesh Union of Working Journalists’ office at Basheerbagh was heading towards Public Gardens abutting the Legislative Assembly, but the police stopped it midway on the ground that protests were not permitted in the area surrounding the Assembly. CPI (M) State secretary B.V. Raghavulu, his CPI counterpart K. Narayana, senior BJP leader Ch. Vidyasagar Rao, TDP legislator T. Srinivas Yadav, Nayani Narsimha Reddy of TRS and representatives of Lok Satta addressed the participants. They criticised Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy government’s attempts to “muzzle” the voice of the media that wrote reports against it. The count down for the present government had commenced with its action in raiding the office of a newspaper and arresting its editor, they said. They threatened to intensify the agitation if the scribes were not released immediately.

Senior journalist K. Ramachandra Murthy, Indian Journalists Union secretary general K. Srinivas Reddy and representatives of various print and electronic media organisations participated.

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