Opposition protests motion towards Media One: Go to Shah, I&B Minister advised Kerala MPs

Ten Lok Sabha MPs from Kerala met Union I&B Minister Anurag Thakur a day after the ministry revoked the broadcasting licence for Media One, a Malayalam channel promoted by outstanding Jamaat-e-Islami members.

Thakur suggested the MPs to strategy the Union Dwelling Minister, because it was his ministry that had denied safety clearance to the channel. The MPs included Kodikunnil Suresh and Okay Sudhakaran from Congress, and N Okay Premachandran of the Revolutionary Socialist Social gathering.

MPs reducing throughout celebration strains — Supriya Sule of the NCP, Mahua Moitra of Trinamool Congress, ET Mohammed Bashir of IUML, and Digvijaya Singh of Congress — have prolonged their assist to Media One.

Kunwar Danish Ali of BSP tweeted that the federal government “shouldn’t deliver again the Emergency with new types of assault on media freedom”. On Sunday, DMK’s Kanimozhi tweeted, “The voices of the folks, media, and civil society are to be heard in a democracy. Silencing dissent, debate and dialogue could be very unhealthy for a democracy.”
Thakur didn’t reply to the criticism.

The MPs from Kerala submitted memorandums to Thakur and to the workplace of Dwelling Minister Amit Shah towards the “stunning and unlucky incident of revocation of Uplinking and Downlinking licence to MediaOne Information”. The “authorities has not been forthcoming as to what these issues are” due to which safety clearance was denied, the MPs stated.

Basheer, Hibi Eden, Abdussamad Samadani, N Prathapan, Adoor Prakash, Dean Kuriakose, and Rajmohan Unnithan had been additionally a part of the delegation.

Suresh, who led the delegation, advised The Indian Specific “seven to eight” Lok Sabha MPs had met Thakur on the difficulty after Funds presentation on February 1.

“First we met him contained in the Home. After that exterior, within the foyer, we had an in depth dialogue with him. He advised us that motion was not taken by the I&B Ministry. We (I&B) aren’t accountable for the cancellation of the licence of the Media One channel. On the similar time, he stated, Ministry of Dwelling Affairs requested I&B to not renew the channel’s licence due to safety causes.”

The MHA, Suresh stated, has “not clearly indicated the rationale; they’ve solely stated on account of safety causes.” “(Thakur) advised us, I’m not capable of do something, as a result of it isn’t an I&B determination, it was taken by MHA, so it’s important to meet the Dwelling Minister, and they’re going to take a choice. In the event that they ask us to withdraw the cancellation, then instantly we’ll withdraw. I&B Ministry has no drawback,” Suresh stated.

He stated the delegation had tried to fulfill the Dwelling Minister in his chamber in Parliament Home, however had been knowledgeable that he was busy. They’d handed over the memorandum to the minister’s workers, however “up to now the Dwelling Minister’s Workplace has not knowledgeable us about an appointment to debate the matter,” Suresh stated.

Premchandran of the RSP stated Thakur had advised them “he’s helpless”, and “we (I&B) don’t have anything to do with this, solely the Dwelling Ministry can do.”

There was “no justification” for the ban, Premachandran stated. “The Dwelling Ministry has to both search an evidence from them, or they’ve to provide a cost — that you haven’t complied with this, or the content material is anti-national. However such a discover has by no means been issued.”

Thakur didn’t reply to requests in search of feedback about his assembly with the Kerala MPs.

Of their memorandum to Thakur, the delegation stated: “As per our understanding, the channel was within the means of renewing the licence with the Ministry and all required documentations had been achieved correctly and on time… This can be a unilateral transfer from the Ministry to silence a media home which is on air since 2013. The fundamental precept of pure justice to listen to the accused earlier than punishment is blatantly denied right here.”

Earlier, on January 31, when the order was issued, John Brittas of CPM, who heads Kairali TV, and Hibi Eden of Congress had additionally written to Thakur expressing concern.

On Sunday, Congress chief in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote to Thakur saying “curbing the liberty of press within the garb of imprecise fees like safety causes would degenerate our State right into a totalitarian regime”, and requested him to right away raise the licence ban. The Chhattisgarh