The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on Monday demanded the withdrawal of cases filed against some media personnel and BJP Assembly polls candidate Vishnukumar Raju in Visakhapatnam.
TDP state unit President Kinjerapu Atchen Naidu alleged that Visakhapatnam police, suo moto, registered FIRs against some media personnel and Vishnukumar Raju with the connivance of the leaders of the ruling YSR Congress and appealed to the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) to initiate measures to immediately withdraw these cases.
In a letter addressed to the CEO with a copy sent to Avinash Kumar, the Principal Secretary in charge of the State in the Election Commission of India in New Delhi, the state Director General of Police, the special general observer of the poll panel and the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), he said that these attempts to file cases against the media personnel only amount to muzzling the freedom of the press.
Observing that the intervention of the poll panel to initiate stern measures certainly yielded fruitful results to check post-poll violence to some extent, Atchen Naidu wrote that the incident that took place at Kancharapalem in Visakhapatnam in which two women sustained grievous injuries for not voting for the YSRCP is highly condemnable.
The media personnel were attacked by the YSRCP leaders as they performed their duty of filing the reports on the attack and the local police, in connivance with the YSRCP leaders, instead of initiating proper action, were only trying to divert the issue by filing cases against the media personnel, he alleged.
The TDP leader said when Vishnukumar Raju, the BJP candidate from the Visakhapatnam North Assembly segment, condemned the attack on these women at a media conference, police registered an FIR against him.
“To set a good precedent, we request you to arrange for the withdrawal of these cases against the media personnel and Mr Vishnukumar Raju and take action against the police officers, who in fact, allowed the post-poll violence and are now trying to muzzle press freedom,” Atchen Naidu said.