Lucknow, August 22 : Union Home Minister Raj Nath Singh said here Saturday that he would consider constitution of a special cell in the ministry to insure the safety and security of journalists in the country. He was speaking to a delegation of Lucknow based journalists who sought to draw his attention to the unabated attacks on mediapersons, not only in Uttar Pradesh but also on other parts of the country. He expressed deep concern on last week’s violent attack on media personnel belonging to the Lucknow edition of Hindustan Times group , the attack on a Dainik Jagran scribe in Shamli as well as the killing of Shahjahanpur based journalist Jagendra singh who was set ablaze alive.
“I will have a word with the PIB director general and take his suggestions to work out a concrete plan in the larger interest of safety and security of mediapersons”, Singh told he delegation . He also agreed to consider the delegation’s demand for constitution of a permanent cell or panel to oversee and monitor various aspects of safety of mediapersons.
Press Council of India member Suman Gupta , who was also a part of the delegation informed the minister that the Council too had set up a Journalists Safety Cell and also expressed the need for enacting a special law for safety and security of journalists. The minister assured that he would also consider the Press Council’s recommendation .
Among others, the delegation included Ram Dutt Tripathi, Vijay Shankar Pankaj,Shiv Shankar Goswami, Suresh Bahadur Singh, Pankaj Jha, Pranshu Misra , Mudit Mathur , Neeraj Srivastava , Kamal Khan, Ruchi Kumar, Ajai Srivastava, Manoj Bhadra, Manish Srivastava , Ashok Misra, Rajendra Kumar, Rajneesh, Rajiv Srivastava and Sharat Pradhan.
