Greater Kashmir’s online report said, “More than 20 policemen barged into GK printing press and directed the employees to stop printing the newspaper”. The employees who tried to resist were beaten up.
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Although the authorities took away the printing plates of the newspaper, the e-paper has been uploaded.
“No newspaper – English, Urdu or Kashmiri – was available as the authorities gagged the media in the Valley”, media houses claimed.
As a result of the crackdown, most Srinagar-based newspapers couldn’t go to print and copies of those who had printed their editions were seized at midnight and early morning raids on their printing presses, the publishers said.
The militant’s death triggered an unprecedented wave of violence across the valley that has left over 40 people dead.
The Jammu Kashmir Police in a late mid-night swoop on Saturday seized the copies of local Urdu and English newspapers in Srinagar raiding the printing presses thus imposing an information moratorium in the Kashmir valley as street violence continued.
Anticipating spread and outpour of protests, the local police, at least in 4 vehicles, raided at least two newspaper printing presses in Rangreth Industrial Estate in uptown Srinagar. Another major English daily of the Valley, Kashmir Reader alleged, “Police on Saturday (it should be Friday night) night raided the printing press and seized the printed copies of Kashmir Reader.” .
Journalists at a meeting of newspaper editors and owners termed “it as an attack on the freedom of press and vowed to fight back at all costs”. “They (government) raided the printing press and took away the (printing) plates with them”, Hayat Ahmad Bhat, the owner of Kashmir Reader that prints from KT printing press told The Indian Express.
Around half a dozen cops made a surprise appearance in press colony around 4 AM when they seized copies of Rising Kashmir. “The employees of the printing press said a posse of police seized the copies”. Lambert Lane is another major newspaper distributing area.
“We reached Lal Chowk ten minutes ago and now we were readying to distribute the newspaper that police men from Budgam police station seized our lot”, an RK staffer said. Now, when things are out of their control and so many people have been killed, they don’t want their actions to be reported. “The delegation also expressed its anguish over the unwarranted gag on media which they feel will only encourage rumour mongering and is bound to prove counterproductive”, a statement issued here said.
Strict curfew is in place in the entire Kashmir Valley. Separatists have urged people to observe the shutdown till Monday.
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Kashmir Valley is on the boil for past over one week in the aftermath of the killing of Burhan Muzaffar Wani, the new-age poster boy of insurgency, by the security forces.
