SAS Nagar, October 5 A meeting of the Punjab units of All India Lawyers Union and Indian Association of Lawyers was held under the chairmanship of Advocate Jaspal Singh Dapar, in which the Special Cell of Delhi Police raided around 30 locations of the media organization 'Newsclick'. And condemned the arrest of its founder Prabir Purkaisab and Human Resources Department head Amit Chakraborty, calling it an undeclared emergency of the Modi government.
Issuing a statement in this regard, All India Lawyers Union Vice President Advocate Darshan Singh Dhaliwal said that this is a direct violation of the personal freedom of the press and journalists and their fundamental rights. He said that the central government is suppressing the dissenting and critical voices of justice-seeking journalists by intimidating them, which is the first fascist step towards taking India towards dictatorship.
He said that the central government is treating journalists, writers and cartoonists like terrorists, which is a threat to democracy. He said that to save democracy in the country, the lawyer community, intellectuals, social organizations, employee unions and farmer unions should openly criticize this step of the Central Government.
Dhaliwal said that due to the Central Government's policy of suppressing the media and press, according to the World Press Freedom Index 2023, India is at the lowest rank of 161st out of 180 countries, which is an indicator of threat to democracy and freedom of citizens. ,
He said that the present central government has not only created ED, Income Tax and CBI. They have deployed their agencies like, but journalists are being arrested under strict laws like Unlawful Activities Prevention Act and UAPA. He said that without the intervention of the judiciary, anyone can be kept behind bars for a long time. Those arrested under this law include ordinary journalists, satirists, cartoonists and comedians.
He demanded from the government that the arrested cardholders should be immediately released and the false cases against them should be dismissed. Tara Singh Chahal, Sarabjit Singh Virk, Amarjeet Singh Longia, Jaspal Singh Dapar, Darshan Singh Dhaliwal, Vikram Singh Sohana, Harsimran Singh, Salman Khan, Gurvinder Singh, Jarnail Singh and Parbhpreet Singh were also present on this occasion.