New Delhi: Kerala high court on Monday, July 10 criticised the state’s police for seizing a journalist’s mobile phone in a probe involving an online media organisation, the Deccan Herald reported.
Senior journalist G. Vaishakan’s phone was seized by the police while investigating a case involving Shajan Skaria, the editor of Marunadan Malayali, the Hindu reported.
Vaishakan moved the Kerala high court which questioned the police’s rationale behind the seizure when the journalist was neither a suspect nor an accused in the case.
The court orally observed that it was a violation of the fundamental rights of the journalist, the Hindu reported. The court said that if the phone’s seizure is necessary for an investigation then there are procedures in place before the police can seize them. A journalist is “part of the fourth estate and may be getting several pieces of information on his phone,” the court noted.
Simply because a journalist has got some information about a crime, his/her mobile cannot be seized without following the procedures under the CrPC. Such actions of the police would create a bad precedent, the court added according to the Hindu report.
Kerala police was also reportedly criticised for its heavy handedness in the case from different quarters, the Deccan Herald report said. The state police had seized all computers and other gadgets of the online media publication and carried out raids at the staff’s houses as part of their search for Skaria.
Skaria was accused of allegedly spreading misinformation and intentional defamation by Communist Party of India (Marxist) CPI(M) MLA PV Sreenijan. The Kerala police have filed a case under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act based on the MLA’s petition.
The Supreme Court on Monday gave Skaria interim protection from arrest after the Kerala high court rejected his bail, the Deccan Herald reported.
Meanwhile, left-front MLA PV Anwar is also facing criticism for threatening a section of online media for publishing reports that were critical of him. The MLA, who is reportedly often embroiled in controversies surrounding his business ventures, had threatened leading journalists from Malayalam news channels earlier.
Opposition leader VD Satheesan on Monday asked whether Anwar was threatening the media with the blessings of the left-front government in Kerala, the Deccan Herald report said.
The Thiruvananthapuram Press Club staged a protest march in front of the government secretariat seeking action against Anwar.
The Kerala police is also under fire for registering cases against the reporters of two leading Malayalam news channels, the report said.