By Raqib Hameed Naik, TwoCircles.net
Srinagar: Weeks after banning the Valley-based English daily Kashmir Reader, the J&K police on Wednesday summoned editor of news website J&K Now Vijdan Mohammad Kawoosa in its cyber cell in Srinagar where the editor has alleged that he was intimidated by the police officers.
“Yesterday (October 19) they summoned me (J and K Now) at its cyber cell in Srinagar where its three officers harassed and intimidated me for over three hours. My ailing father was accompanying me,” Kawoosa told Twocircles.net
According to Kawoosa, the police had summoned him regarding a video statement of Hizbul Mujahideen outfit that its website had published over a month ago as part of its routine news.
“Being journalists, we receive thousands of emails from every section of the society, including the police and the government itself, requesting publication. Similarly, I received the anonymous email by Hizb,” claimed Kawoosa.
“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,” he added.
The police officers, as per Kawoosa, shouted at him, saying that the news post on his news site J and K Now would “instigate youth towards violence and he was an equal party to the crime.
Vijdan Mohammad KawoosaTaking a step forward, the police officers even threatened to make a case on him, if he did not reveal the person he was in ‘contact’ with among the militant group, claimed Kawoosa.
“ 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, the police men made note of most of his e-mail addresses, phone numbers and family members, and also took the password of his Facebook profile to which my website’s page (followed by 300,000 people) is linked.
Further they have seized the driving license of the editor and on Thursday he had been asked to report before Superintendent of Police (SP) in Srinagar.
Earlier this month, four to five Jammu and Kashmir police officials had paid a visit to the office of Kashmir Reader in Srinagar along with an order issued of District Magistrate Srinagar which called for immediate ban on publishing the newspaper.