Scribes' body condemns jourlist killing in Gaya

Guwahati, Oct 25: Another middle-aged jourlist, this time it is in poll-bound Bihar, has lost his life to the perpetuators. Mithilesh Pandey, 40, was shot dead on October 25 in his hometown under Gaya district. According to the family source, the miscreants (two masked persons) entered the victim’s house on Saturday evening and shot at him to death. Pandey was taken to a nearby hospital by his family members, but he succumbed to injuries after some time.

Jourlists’ Forum Assam (JFA) has condemned the incident and reiterates its demand for a tiol policy for justice to all slain media persons across the country. The murder of Pandey has increased the tally of slaughtered media persons in India this year till date up to five.

Earlier Hemant Yadav, another middle aged jourlist of Uttar Pradesh was shot dead on the night of October 3 at Dhee locality of Chandauli district. Yadav, who worked for Hindi news channel TV24, was attacked by two motorcycle-borne miscreants. He was taken to a nearby hospital where he succumbed to his injuries.

Prior to that, a Thane based jourlist Raghavendra Dube was killed by the miscreants in July. Similarly Jagendra Singh from UP and Sandeep Kothari from Madhya Pradesh lost their lives to assassitors in separate incidents in June this year.

“We reiterate our demand for a tiol action plan to safeguard the brave jourlists who pursue critical jourlism,” said a statement issued by JFA president Rupam Barua and secretary va Thakuria adding that the robust Indian media fraternity must rise on the occasion to compel the authority to punish every single murderer of jourlists under the rule of law.