Mangaluru police detained Kerala journalists even after they showed accreditation: Witness
KASARGOD: Mangaluru City police detained around 15 journalists from Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana who landed in the city to report on the police firing that killed two persons.
Six reporters and cameramen from four news channels in Kerala were detained while they were speaking to the relatives of Nausin (23) and Jalil Kudroli (49) — who were killed in police firing during a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act at Bunder in Mangaluru on Thursday.
The detained journalists were Mujeeb Rahman and Pratheesh Kakoth of Asianet News, Anand Kotilla and Ranju Gn of News 24, Shabeer and Aneesh KK of MediaOne, and Sumesh M, cameraman of News 18. The journalists are incommunicado as the police have taken away their mobile phones.
The journalists were at Wenlock Government Hospital, where the bodies of the slain protesters were kept for postmortem. “We were taking the bites of the relatives when the police commissioner arrived at the hospital and asked us to go out of the hospital compound,” said Vijesh K, driver of News 24 media vehicle. He is now waiting for his colleagues at Talapady, on the border of Kasaragod and Dakshina Kannada on the National Highway.
Outside the hospital gate, the officers asked for ID cards of the journalists. “He said only accredited journalists could report from Mangaluru,” Vijesh said.
Mangaluru police say people ‘claiming’ to be journalists detained, cite no accreditation
Police said several people who tried to enter District Wenlock Hospital, ‘claiming’ to be journalists, were detained on Friday morning in Mangaluru.
“The detained people were allegedly journalists but they were questioned as they didn’t have proper documents to verify their credentials,” said Mangaluru Police Commissioner PS Harsha.
“The concerned DIPR will be requested to verify their credentials as journalists and further steps will be initiated,” said Harsha.
ANI reported that Kerala Revenue Minister E Chandrasekharan had asked the state chief secretary to contact the Karnataka government and seek information on the detentions.
“Once I received the information that Kerala journalists including those from Kasaragod have been taken into custody by Police in Mangaluru, I asked Kerala chief secretary to contact Karnataka government and conduct an inquiry into it,” Chandrasekharan was quoted as saying.
Kerala Director General of Police (DGP) Lokanath Behra later confirmed that he had spoken “to (the) Karnataka DGP in the morning” and she had assured him that if the names of the journalists were shared, they would be released and sent back.
Meanwhile, security has been beefed up at the Mangaluru hospital where several people injured in Thursday’s violence are being treated.