In the first of these

incidents, Mohammad Abdul Waheed Chishti, a reporter for a local Urdu daily was

abused and attacked by supporters of an Islamic cleric at a press conference on

October 14 in the state capital Lucknow. The press conference was called by the

Imam (or head) of the historic Jama Masjid mosque in Delhi to discuss a recent

judicial verdict regarding a site in the town of Ayodhya, the centre of a

dispute between different religious institutions since

1949.

Chishti was verbally

abused by the Imam after asking a question on the possibility that some of his

statements may have aggravated the public response to the verdict, before being

assaulted by the Imam’s personal assistants and

bodyguards.

In the second incident,

the Kanpur

offices of the HT Media group were raided by a team of local policemen at 11pm

on October 15. Editorial and other

staff members of the media house, which publishes two widely circulated dailies,

the Hindustan Times in English

and Hindustan in Hindi, were

detained and the premises sealed, preventing distribution of the following day’s

editions.

The raid was in response

to the newspapers’ reporting of a case where a nine-year old girl was allegedly

sexually abused and murdered by the son of her school’s manager. The reports

compelled local police to prosecute the suspect after an unexplained delay of

eighteen days.

The Delhi Union of

Journalists, a constituent unit of the IFJ-affiliate, the Indian Journalists’

Union, has called for the state government to

take immediate action in both cases.

“We join our partners in

India in denouncing these two shocking incidents in Uttar Pradesh and call on

the local authorities to do all that is needed to see those responsible for

these acts brought to justice,” IFJ

Asia-Pacific Director Jacqueline Park

said.

“Journalists must not

be subjected to unwarranted attacks and harassment when they are exercising

their duties to inform people of what is happening in their

communities.”

For further information contact IFJ

Asia-Pacific on +612 9333 0919

The IFJ represents more than 600,000 journalists in 125

countries

Find the IFJ on Twitter: @ifjasiapacific