CHANDIGARH: Barjinder Singh managing director of the largest selling Punjabi daily from Jalandhar the Ajit said here on Wednesday that the uncalled for and unjustified restrictions on the paper had made it extremely difficult for it to function.
Speaking at a meet the press program at the Chandigarh Press Club he said that every evening the authorities forced the paper not to publish one report or the other or a portion of it without assigning any reasons for imposing the cuts It had often happened that the authorities would not permit Ajit to publish a report which went into print in. other papers without any problem Even certain items which had been on the TV and the radio were not allowed in the Ajit.
Barjinder Singh felt that the Ajit had been singled out by the authorities perhaps in the hope that it would demoralize the paper and the people. The other reason according to him could be that the Punjab Government was trying to hide its own failures. Barjinder Singh said it was strange that no officer accepted the responsibility of passing an order asking the paper to withdraw a certain item. They just tried to get the reports removed forcibly with the help of the police. They would descend on the newspaper officer at odd hours and would not allow the printing to go on unless a particular item which had already gone in an earlier edition was removed The Ajit prints four editions every day.
In reply to a question Barjinder Singh said that the management of the Ajit might go to the Press Council on this issue.
He did not think that the restriction imposed on the Ajit were part of a conspiracy and added that the authorities were doing all this in the hope that it might help them retrieve the situation in Punjab.
He gave details of the seizure of copies of the Ajit on the night between August 12-13 and also on the morning of August 14 at Ropar Ahmedgarh and other places.
Article extracted from this publication >> August 23, 1991
