Ashish Shelar, the chief whip, BJP, Maharashtra Assembly has said that the arrest of journalist Arnab Goswami, is a political vendetta by the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government for investigative journalism in the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput case and raising questions on the government.
“If you look at the happenings of the case closely it reeks of personal ego and political vendetta more than a criminal offence. While it can be debated if the method adopted for investigative journalism was correct or not it can also be debated on what type of language needs to be used in investigative journalism….and not everyone may agree on this” said Shelar while in a live webcast with Kailashnath Adhikari, MD, Governance Now.
The senior BJP leader pointed out that going by pure legal aspects of the case, after investigation, the police had filed ‘A’ Summary proceedings in the court. The magistrate accepted the case and thereafter closed the case. There was no appeal in the case because a journalist has raised the issue, questioned and criticized the government and the manner in which the home the minister used a threatening tone in the state assembly and said that govt will reopen the case this raises the question if the journalist is arrested and made an accused and denied bail it raises questions. The Supreme Court interim bail to Arnab Goswami today case clearly proves that there is no connection with any criminal case but a personal agenda and vendetta” said the BJP leader during the Visionary Talk series held by the public policy and governance analysis platform.
Criticizing Mumbai Police Commissioner, Parambir Singh, Shelar said that after taking instructions from the government if a police officer openly challenges a journalist “we will show you” and the happenings thereafter I don’t think there is any doubt that it is political vendetta.”
While responding to a question on the BJP terming Goswami’s arrest as the death of freedom and likening it to the state of emergency and if the statement was justified, the senior BJP leader said that ever since the MVA government came to power in the state, such incidents have been frequently taking place. He gave the examples of a retired naval officer who was beaten up after he forwarded the cartoon of CM Uddhav Thackeray on Whatsapp, registration of a criminal case against an ABP news channel journalist’s for questioning travel permission to Wadhawans during the lockdown, demolition of actress Kangana Ranaut’s office and added that the arrest of Goswami raises questions if there is any freedom of speech in Maharashtra.
While speaking on the arrest of a journalist by the BJP government in UP in Hathras gang rape and murder case, Shelar said that the entire leftist media made a tornado of the incident as if there has been no precedent of this case.
“When the victim must get justice, entire leftist media made a tornado of the incident as if there has been no precedent of this case and discredited the Yogi Adityanath and BJP government. As the government wanted to protect the witness in the case, it did not allow anyone to contact the victim’s family” he said.
Shelar also added that media organizations must respect counter views without making criminals out of people on the other side. “Fairness is paramount to news media. In that fairness, news should not be fake or disseminated wrongly. News organizations must use correct words and desist from character assassination of people whose ideology may be different than theirs and not hold them as if there is no bigger criminal than the person on the other side, otherwise, people will lose faith in media and politics and this will not auger well for both” he said.
