Altaf Hamid Rao
Calls for early enactment of Protection of Media Professionals Bill-2020
MIRPUR (AJK), (Parliament Times) : President of his faction of Kashmir Electronic Media Association Mirpur, AJK, Syed Sajaad Hussain Bukhari, has called for immediate enactment of the effective Protection of Journalists and Media Professionals Bill-2020 in the country including Azad Jammu Kashmir.
Our Special AJK Correspondent Altaf Hamid Rao reports from Mirpur that while talking to newsmen here on Monday he expressed concern over the continual delay in approval of the draft Protection of Journalists and Media Professionals Bill – 2020 that would provide a safe environment for practice of journalism in Pakistan.
“The draft Bill, which provides a strong base for legislation for protection of media, was presented to the federal cabinet by the Ministry of Human Rights a year ago but is still awaiting approval by the body”, Bukhari underlined.
The Kashmir Electronic Media President called for the empowerment of the Independent Commission which, he observed, might prove to be the main mechanism for ensuring media safety and for holding accountable those to attack or threaten journalists, he urged.
Strongly condemning the continual extra ordinary restrictions against the freedom of expression by the Indian occupational forces in the Indian Illegally occupied Jammu Kashmir State, the KEMA Mirpur President Sajjad Bukhari termed it a cowardly act on the part of the Delhi’s installed puppet administration of the IIOJK to gag the true voices of Kashmir through such coercive tactics also against global moral norms and commitments.
Bukhari warned the suppressive Indian authorities and their stooges in Indian Illegally occupied Kashmir that such mean and cowardly acts to suppress the freedom of expression in the bleeding vale of Kashmir could not sustain for a long time and the media would continue raising the voice of Kashmiris till their just and principled struggle for securing their right of liberation of the motherland from forced and unlawful Indian rule reaches to its logical end.
He called upon the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights to immediately intervene to get the victimization of the Kashmiri journalists by the occupational Indian oppressive forces aimed at to gag the freedom of expression in the Indian occupied part of the disputed Himalayan state.
Bukhari emphasized the need of immediate intervention by the international community and world protection of human rights forums to ensure the complete freedom of press across the world particularly in those areas including the bleeding vale of Indian-occupied Jammu & Kashmir where the voice of freedom was being today suppressed by the oppressive forces through one way or the other.
The President of Kashmir Electronic Media Association Mirpur said that because of the complete free-media policy of the government of Pakistan, the media in the country was currently enjoying full freedom as compared to various past dictatorial regimes, when the press had been suffering with various sanctions like censorship, they recalled.
They said that since the press and a nation rise and fall together, freedom of expression was imperative for building of a strong stable and healthy nation.Bukhari also emphasized upon the government of AJK to get ensured the implementation of the 8th wage board award by the owners of the newspapers of the country vis-a-vis the early grant of the stipulated retainer ship allowance for the AJK-based correspondents and reporters of various national and regional dailies and periodicals since the 7th wage board award also clearly spoke of the strong recommendations for regular payment of the stipulated retainer ship allowance to the newspaper correspondents performing duties in the district and tehsil headquarters in Azad Jammu & Kashmir.
He also demanded of the AJK government for managing the inter-provincial, regional and international study tours of AJK’s working journalists as well as the holding of the journalists capacity building / training workshops in all ten district headquarters of AJK by the state government to ensure the quality working by the newspaper and news agencies correspondents in AJK.