Guwahati: Journalists’ Forum Assam (JFA), while expressing shock over the murder of a young television journalist in Tamil Nadu, demanded stringent punishments to the culprits. Isravel Moses (27), a Kancheepuram based scribed was hacked to death by a group of anti-social individuals on 8 November 2020). Moses, who used to work for a Tamil news channel (Tamizhan TV) was attacked by the goons with sharp weapons near to his residence.
He was rushed to Chromepet government hospital by the midnight, but the doctors declared him brought dead. The police arrested Manoj Selvam, Venkatesan Sekar aka Attai, Vignesh Tirumalai alias Eli Appu and Navamani Duraisamy suspecting their involvements with the murder. Earlier, another television journalist (Ratan Singh) from Ballia locality of Uttar Pradesh was murdered. Singh (45), who used to work for Hindi news channel SaharaSamay was reportedly shot dead by his neighbours on 24 August to settle their old enmity and property disputes. Similarly, a young scribe from Tinsukia in eastern Assam (Bijendeep Tanti) was found murdered on 8 August at his rented office.
Tanti (32) was associated with NewsTimeAssam and also ran a facebook portal named DinPratidinNortheast. Madhya Pradesh’s Niwari locality based journalist Sunil Tiwari (35), who worked for a Gwalior-based Hindi newspaper, was beaten, stabbed and shot to death in on 22 July. Same day, UP journalist Vikram Joshi (45) succumbed to his injuries in a Ghaziabad hospital. Joshi, who worked for local newspaper JanSagarToday, was attacked on 20 July by a group of goons and shot at him in front of his two minor daughters as he lodged a police complaint for eve-teasing against some goons.
The first journo-casualty in India this year was reported from UP’s Unnao locality, where young scribe Shubham Mani Tripathi (25), who worked for Hindi daily KampuMail, fell prey to bullets of two shooters on 19 June, said JFA president Rupam Barua and secretary Nava Thakuria, adding that Shubham reported on illegal sand mining practices in his area and thus the brave journalist invited enmity from a group of criminals, some of them were already arrested by the police.