The Hindu : N. Ram: we'll challenge this outrageous action in court

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 08, 2003

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N. Ram: we'll challenge this outrageous action in court

By K.T. Sangameswaran and Divya Ramamurthi

Photo: R. Ragu

At the entrance to Kasturi Buildings, the Editor-in-Chief, N. Ram, speaks to a group of employees of The Hindu and mediapersons, soon after the departure of the police team.

CHENNAI NOV. 7. The Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu, N. Ram, condemned the decision of the Legislative Assembly to imprison the staff of the newspaper and the police effort to carry out the order.

"This is a direct challenge to the freedom of speech and expression," Mr. Ram told a crush of journalists at the newspaper's head office. "We will challenge the move in court and in all democratic fora, starting with this newspaper."

"It's outrageous and highly undemocratic. ... It has become a major national question. Political India and constitutional India will have to make up its mind on the issues at stake," he said.

"It's a criminal misadventure, a foolish misadventure. It is going to backfire," he added.

When the police first tried to enter the newspaper head office on Anna Salai, Mr. Ram asked them to show the arrest warrant. "They couldn't show anything. ... They just slunk away."

The police, he said, came back a second time, but with only one warrant — for the Executive Editor, Malini Parthasarathy. The two officers asked him to cooperate, "implying there would be arrests if we did not."

"I told the police `I am a responsible person. They are not here. Believe me,' but they insisted on searching the office. They asked me where the others were. I told them `I am not a police informer' and that they should do their own investigation."

Referring to the articles that the privileges committee examined, he said they merely analysed the statements of the Chief Minister and there was fair criticism of intolerance. "How can this be derogatory to the Assembly? It was a rather measured criticism of the Chief Minister," he said.

The day's events showed "not just intolerance, but crude authoritarianism of the worst kind. ... This is not the first time that Tamil Nadu is witnessing an assault on the freedom of the press, but this is the worst. Earlier, it was the privilege issue against the Editor of a Tamil magazine (Ananda Vikatan) S. Balasubramanian... later another journalist, K.P. Sunil (then in The Illustrated Weekly of India) was targeted."

The latest decision, he said, "is a clear display of the doctrine of `sky-high powers' that P.H. Pandian proposed when he was the Speaker."

The entire episode, Mr. Ram said, might lead to some good in that it will help to keep in check such violations. "The issue does not concern a single newspaper but the entire press. ... I appeal to journalists to consider the matter deeply."

Asked whether the newspaper's journalists would seek bail, Mr. Ram shot back: "We have to get the resolution itself annulled."

He said the newspaper would file a criminal complaint against the police for barging into the house of bureau chief V. Jayanth, threatening his wife, and even going into the bedroom.

As Mr. Ram escorted the police to their car after the search, about 200 employees mobbed them, shouting slogans, "Down with police high-handedness," "Down with Jayalalithaa" and "Long live the press".

Pacifying the crowd, Mr. Ram said: "The authors of this outrageous misadventure will pay heavily for this."

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