Srinagar: Founder and editor of a news portal in Srinagar Thursday said Police was threatening him with dire consequences after his portal published a statement of militant group Hizbul Mujahideen.
“I urgently want to bring the Kashmir media fraternity’s attention to this fresh fact that after banning Kashmir Reader, Jammu and Kashmir police yesterday (October 19) summoned me at its cyber cell in Srinagar where its three officers harassed and intimidated me for over three hours. My ailing father was accompanying me,” said Vijdan Kawoosa, founder-editor of www.JandKNow.com.
The police summoned Kawoosa regarding a video statement of Hizbul Mujahideen outfit that appeared on the portal over a month ago. "Being journalists, we receive thousands of e-mails from every section of the society, including the police and the government itself, requesting publication. Similarly, I received the anonymous e-mail by Hizb", he said.
However, the police is now accusing me of “sympathizing with the militant group” and being “on their payrolls” or “having links”, only because my website was the first to share its statement then, which was later copied by media based in Kashmir and elsewhere, Kawoosa said.
"These police officers shouted at me, saying that the news post on my news site J and K Now would “instigate youth towards violence and I was an equal party to the crime”. They threatened to make a case on me if I did not reveal the person I was in ‘contact’ with among the militant group. Even though I gave them open access to my e-mail account on which I had received the mail, they continued to intimidate me."
Later, they made note of most of my e-mail addresses, phone numbers and family members, and also took the password of my Facebook profile to which my website’s page is linked. They asked me to cooperate or they would “deal with me the way police deals”.
"They have seized my driving license and asked me to report before an SP at 10 am today (October 20) at the same venue," he said.
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