NJ THAKURIA
Guwahati: Patriotic People’s Front Assam (PPFA), a forum of
nationalist citizens in northeast India, while expressing serious
concern over a declared media interaction with a separatist militant
leader who continues to threaten the seventy and integrity of India at
Guwahati Press Club (GPC) recently, demanded an unconditional apology
from the press club committee.
Mentionable is that the club committee organized a formal audio
interview with Paresh Barua, the self-styled military chief of banned
United Liberation Front of Assam-Independent, in its premises at 6.30
pm on 21 February 2021. The press club office bearers including were
clearly visible in live footages of various news channels as they were
eagerly waiting for the militant leader’s expected call.
From the dais of GPC auditorium at Ambari locality in the city, one
office bearer received the call from Paresh Barua and was supposed to
transfer the sound system so that all present reporters could listen
to his voice and then interact. But because of the arrival of some
police personnel on duty, the program was abruptly concluded.
It is beyond doubt that the press club committee desired to provide
space to the militant leader who recently threatened to execute two
employees of Quippo Oil and Gas Infrastructure Limited (namely Pranab
Kumar Gogoi and Ram Kumar), who were abducted by his armed cadres from
Diyun drilling locality of Arunachal Pradesh on 21 December and since
then they are under their custody.
People of the region may remember how a small group of journalists and
patriotic citizens dared to hoist National flag at the same press
club premises defying the diktat of militant groups including the
Paresh Barua led Ulfa. They took it as a mission to pay tributes to
the martyrs of India’s freedom struggles even though the separatist
militants threatened the participants of Independence Day and Republic
Day celebrations of dire consequences.
“GPC has a legacy of anti-terror protests as its member-scribes
marched on the street demanding justice to the family of journalist
Kamala Saikia, who was brutally killed by Ulfa militants on 9 August
1991,” said a PPFA statement adding, “It is shameful that the press
club committee has done mockery to the spirit of devoted journalists
by inviting a dreaded anti-national militant for a program where he
was supposed to address reporters from an undisclosed location
glorifying his stand on separatism, abduction, extortion, etc.”
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