The People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) has condemned the attempt at criminalising the writings of Supriya Sharma, executive editor of the digital news publication Scroll.in. Also read: Editor’s Guild slams U.P. FIR against scribeIn a statement, PUCL president Ravi Kiran Jain and general secretary V. Suresh said the criminal provisions invoked against the journalist do not apply to the complaint made by the aggrieved individual. It is well known by now that nobody is allowed to be critical of the PM or show his constituency in a bad light,” the statement read. “A pandemic and the subsequent lockdown should not be excuses to clamp down on the media,” they stated, condemning the attempts to intimidate media persons and prevent them from playing the role of an independent and critical watchdog of liberty, democracy and governance.

Source: The Hindu June 23, 2020 16:25 UTC