NEW DELHI: (PTI) Major opposition parties will boycott the poll broadcast and telecast from the All India Radio and Doordarshan to protest against the “censorship of their scripts”.

Talking to reporters here the opposition combine National Front spokesman G Lakshmanna said the Telugu Desam, the Dray ida Munnatra Kazhagham and the Congress (S), all constituents of the front and the BJ.P. have already decided to boycott the broad cast and the telecast.

Another major constituent of the Front, Janata Dal, is most likely to follow suit, he said.

The CPI and the CPI (M) too were considering boycotting the broadcast and the telecast, he said.

Citing an example of Lok Dal (B), Mr. Vajpayee said that some “national parties had been declared as national parties, entitled to election broadcasts, obviously to serve certain Congress (I) purposes”.

“Almost the whole of Lok Dal merged with the Janata Dal. The rump Lok Dal was led by Mr. Bahuguna. Now M1. Bahuguna is dead and even his wife and child ten have joined the CongressI. But Lok Dal (B) continues to be Tecognised as a national party”, Mr, Vajpayee said.

Mr.Lakshmanna said that they had been told by the electronic media authorities to avoid references to the Bofors gun deal and the use of name of the Prime Minister, Mr. Rajiv Gandhi, in their scripts. The National Front will take up the matter with the election commission, he said.

The opposition, he said, was not depending on the government media for its publicity both the AIR and Doordarshan have been turned into private organizations” of the ruling party, he added.

Bharatiya Janata Party Leader Atal Behari Vajpayee told a press conference here that the party had decided to boycott the election broadcasts to protest against the censorship by the government Controlled media.

“I am sorry ‘to say that the government controlled media are not only obsessed with the ruling Party at the center, they have been consistently hostile to the opposition parties”, Mr. Vajpayee said.

A report from Kerala said the Left Front had also decided to boycott the election broadcasts.

Article extracted from this publication >>  November 10, 1989