The Supreme Court on Friday stopped the Assam Police from taking any coercive action against The Wire Editor Siddharth Varadarajan and veteran journalist Karan Thapar.
“Post the matter on 15 September. Meanwhile, no coercive action shall be taken against petitioner No.2 and members of petitioner-Foundation, including the Consulting Editor pursuant to FIR registered u/s 152 BNS subject to their …… cooperating with investigation,” said the Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi.
The top court also asked both of them to cooperate with the investigation in the cases registered against them.
The apex court passed the order on the plea filed by Varadrajan and Thapar challenging the summons issued to them by the Crime Branch in relation to a first information report (FIR) registered under Section 152 of Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS).
Senior Advodate Nitya Ramakrishnan appeared for the petitioners and stated that the FIR in question dates back to May and was invoked soon after the Supreme Court granted protection in the other case, Bar and Bench reported.
This comes a day after fifteen Members of Parliament have signed a joint statement condemning what they described as the “harassment” of The Wire journalists Siddharth Varadarajan, Karan Thapar, and others by the Assam Police under the newly rebranded sedition law, calling it “a blatant attack on press freedom and democracy itself.”
“We are extremely concerned by the Assam Police’s harassment of Siddharth Varadarajan, Karan Thapar, and other journalists associated with The Wire,” the MPs said, alleging the BJP government is “misusing” rebranded sedition laws to intimidate independent voices and silence criticism.
The statement described the summons issued to the journalists, despite protection granted by the Supreme Court, as “a blatant attack on press freedom and democracy itself.”
This story was originally published in maktoobmedia.com. Read the full story here.
