Is Pinarayi any different from Modi? Assembly engages in heated debate

The Crime Branch raid on the Kozhikode office of Asianet News has triggered comparisons between Pinarayi Vijayan and Narendra Modi.

"What is the difference between Pinarayi and Modi," Congress MLA P C Vishnunath hurled a rhetorical question while moving an adjournment motion on the issue of press freedom in Kerala in the light of the SFI encroachment into the Kochi office of Asianet and the Crime Branch raid of Asianet's Kozhikode office.

"When the Modi government unleashed Income Tax raids on the BBC offices in Mumbai and Delhi, the CPM had put out a statement that said it was the standard tactic of the Modi government to intimidate the media using the IT Department," Vishnunath said. "You just have to replace the words Modi and IT in the BJP's official statement with Pinarayi and Crime Branch and it would still read right," he said.

He said the Pinarayi dispensation was using the situation to intimidate and stifle media houses that were giving anti-government reports. "If a media house has done something wrong, there are institutional and established means to go after them. But what has the SFI got to do with this," Vishnunath said. "Never before has any outfit entered the office of a media house and issued threats," he said.

Vishnunath said the police had taken things to the level of harrassment. He said the Kozhikode police had issued emergency summons to Sindhu Suryakumar, the Asianet executive editor who was now in a hospital in Thiruvananthapuram after an operation, to appear before it in Kozhikode the ver next day.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that the police did not check the health condition of a person before sending summons. "If the person has a problem, she can convey this to the police. The police can be accused of harrassment if it insists on the person's appearance even after the difficulty was conveyed," the Chief Minister said. Further, he said action had been taken against SFI members for entering the Asianet office. He said action had been taken though it was clear from visuals that they had not indulged in any violence.

Pinarayi said it would be far-fetched to compare the Crime Branch raid on Asianet with the IT raids on BBC offices. "The BBC documentary had exposed a leader's complicity in a major communal riot. In this case (Asianet raid), there is no report against the LDF government or its leaders. Therefore, to call this an act of vendetta would be taking things too far," Pinarayi said.

He said the case involved the creation of a fake video and the use of a minor girl without her knowledge in the report. "Such actions cannot be protected in the name of journalism," the Chief Minister said.

He said that, unlike in the case of his government, the Modi dispensation had taken against media houses like the Wire, Newsclick and NDTV for putting out reports critical of the government. "We have never questioned the right of the media to criticise us. Though we have been severely criticised by various media, we have never acted against any of them," he said.

"Raids on media houses, jailing of journalists, slashing of newsprint quota and black laws against the media are not our style. Such practices have been resorted to only by the BJP and the Congress," Pinarayi said.

Pinarayi also said that the government was in fact happy with the anti-drug reports channels and newspapers had put out after the government had announced a major offensive against the use of drugs and psychotropic substances.

If so, Opposition Leader V D Satheesan wanted to know why the complaint filed by the CPM Independent P V Anwar stated that the Asianet's anti-drug campaign was a conspiracy to undermine the growing importance of government schools.