Press Club Of India which is an organization for journalists and media professionals has called for a protest meet with the view of the unjust restrictions imposed towards the coverage by parliament.
This comes after the Centre restricted the entry of media persons in Parliament early in 2020 since the outbreak of Covid-19. Journalists so far since the pandemic cannot access media galleries in the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha and the Central Hall.
Retaliating to the case of media freedom, the journalists have decided to make their voice heard by staging a protest meet today at 1pm assembling around the premises of Press Club Of India. In a letter drafted ress Club Of India, Delhi Union of Journalists and other media organizations, states the subject of the protest along laying down their demands.
Demands stated in the letter shared on Twitter reads:
Restore the entry of all journalists having permanent passes to the Parliament complex and the Press Gallery.
Implement the previous decision taken by the Hon’ble Speaker, Lok Sabha, in July 2021 to allow all journalists holding permanent passes into Parliament.
Restore entry of veteran journalist into Central Hall of Parliament.
Restore the L&D category for senior and veteran journalist as a mark of honour of their long services in the profession.
Reconstitute Press Advisory Committee at the earliest
'The restrictions have played havoc and made the situation much more difficult for media persons in carrying out their professional duties/responsibilities and had led to large-scale retrenchments in the fraternity,' the letter further read along the mentions of time, date and venue of protest meet.
In another tweet by the official Twitter handle of Press Club Of India, it wrote, 'In the largest democracy of the world, the entry of journalists in the Parliament is regulated through “lottery system”. This seems to be a ploy to censor transmission of news and the information to people. This is a very dangerous trend in a parliamentary democracy like India.'
On November 27, journalists of this notable council wrote an open letter to the leaders of all political parties in Parliament, protesting the restrictions on the media’s access to Parliament. The letter pointed out that there was no need for such curbs now, adding that public places such as malls, restaurants and cinema halls had been reopened.
On seeing this, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Congress leader in the Lok Sabha felt the need to ease out restrictions on allowing media to the press gallery of the Parliament. Pointing the concern and danger of being isolated otherwise, he had written a letter to the Speaker Om Birla on Sunday, November 28.
His letter addressed to the Speaker read, 'Now, the malls, restaurants, cinema halls, marketplace and other public places have been opened due to withdrawal of the covid restrictions. However, the restrictions imposed during the pandemic are still on for the media persons as far as covering the proceedings of the Parliament is concerned.'
