Nitumoni Saikia (Editor-in-chief of News Channel Pratidin Time);

Ajit Kumar Bhuyan (Chief Editor of News channel Prag News);

Afrida Hussain (Editor of Online News Portal ‘InsideNE’ TV); and

Manjit Mahanta (Convenor of Forum against Citizenship Act Amendment Bill)

Assam

HRDA issued an urgent appeal to the National Human Rights Commission of India on 24 April, 2019 regarding the apprehension that the state government might initiate criminal charges against Mr. Nitumoni Saikia, Mr. Ajit Kumar Bhuyan, Mr. Afrida Hussain and Mr. Manjit Mahanta including that of sedition as they have been critical about the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill.

A complaint was sent to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) from Mr. Vinay Joshi, head of the Maharashtra based Legal Rights Observatory, a voluntary organization against the above-mentioned journalists. The complaint falsely alleged that these media outfits promoted violence during the anti- Citizenship (Amendment) Bill protests. The complaint asked for actions against these journalists for “their role in spreading militant ideologies and actively assisting fresh recruitment of Assam youth in banned militant groups by running loud media propaganda.” The entire north-eastern part of India went through massive protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill and during protests the videos of some young people talking about opposing the Bill through violent means went viral on social media platforms before they were broadcasted in the news channels.

HRDA prayed for immediate and transparent investigation into the above-mentioned incident of arbitrary charges and harassment of the HRDs and assurance that there is no arbitrary use of the law with intent to suppress and intimidate the democratic voice of these HRDs.