Kashmir journalists deplore KPC closure, call it ‘sad and distressing'

The Jammu and Kashmir administration on January 17 de-registered the vibrant Kashmir Press Club (KPC) and handed over the erstwhile club building to the J&K Estates Department “for the moment”, citing unspecified “threat of breach of peace and the safety of bonafide journalists.”

While occupying the KPC building, the government also withdrew allotment of land and handed over the club infrastructure to the Estates Department, alluding to “potential law-and-order situation”.

The administration issued a detailed statement through the Department of Information and Public Relations (DIPR), saying that the government was concerned “over the emergent situation which has arisen due to the unpleasant turn of events involving two rival warring groups using the banner of the Kashmir Press Club.”

The real KPC story

The Kashmir Press Club came into being as the Valley’s largest independent journalists’ body in mid-2019. In the first-ever election, the management was elected for a period of two years. The election process was monitored by an independent election commission and neutral observers included lawyers and senior journalists.

Over the next two years, the KPC membership rose from 250 to 300. The press club became a leading voice for raising issues related to journalists’ welfare, their harassment and shutting down of the internet. The club management threw open a library, a fitness centre, a couple of lounges which were used as work stations by journalists to file stories; a canteen and a conference hall for seminars and press conferences. The club became a go-to-place for Valley’s journalists and also for guest scribes to get in touch with their colleagues in Kashmir.

Jammu and Kashmir lost its special status on August 5, 2019. On May 2021, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha issued an order asking the KPC, initially registered as a society, to re-register itself under the Societies Registration Act.

KPC’s first president Shuja ul Haq said, “We submitted all documents. It took months for the process to complete, which included police verification. Between July 2021 and December 2021, we sent several official communications to the concerned authorities to expedite the process so that we can hold elections for the next body.”

On December 29, 2021, the KPC received a duly signed letter from the authorities which approved the club’s re-registration process. On January 13, 2022, the KPC management announced dates for elections.

Surprisingly, on January 14, 2022, the Registrar of Societies and Firms gave an official communiqué putting the re-registration process “in abeyance”. The order cited adverse Senior Superintendent of Police and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) reports to put the compulsory verification process of the elected members on hold.

On January 15, the KPC and seven premier journalists’ associations alleged that a disgruntled tiny group of scribes, led by a suspended KPC member, illegally entered the club premises and created ruckus. They said the group, aided by a posse of the J&K police personnel and the paramilitary, “took over” the club and simultaneously self-appointed an interim body.

Incidentally, the administration had announced a “weekend lockdown” in the Kashmir Valley on January 15, but it allowed a self-styled ‘interim body’ to occupy the KPC.

The administration’s meddling into the club’s affairs obviously did not go down well with the Valley’s journalistic fraternity. Leading journalists’ associations, including the Kashmir Working Journalist Association (KWJA), Journalist Federation of Kashmir (JFK) and others issued a joint statement expressing anguish over the “illegal and arbitrary takeover of the KPC.”

“The incident and the circumstances of takeover on January 15 by a group of journalists came as another shock. The club was locked from outside and no member was allowed to enter on Sunday (January 16),” said former president of KPC Shuja ul Haq.

Vibrant Voice Silenced

Former KPC general secretary Ishfaq Tantry said the J&K administration’s ultimate goal was “to shutdown” the club. “To achieve its goal,” Tantry said, “they (the administration) tried to install a group of journalists. They wanted to stifle the voice of journalists that resonated through the forum (KPC), the only democratic and independent journalists’ body in the Valley.”

“But we believe that journalists are capable and professional enough to keep the flame glowing and confront these challenges ahead. Journalism has thrived in Kashmir and it will survive all crests and troughs in future as well,” Tantry added.

Senior journalist Naseer Ganai said that shutting down the press club was “very sad and distressing in multiple ways.” “It is a tragic moment for all of us. The press club was a vibrant space where all journalists would gather, ideate, exchange ideas, and learn from one another,” Ganai told The Federal.

A senior broadcast journalist said that with the closure of the press club, “all journalists in Kashmir have lost their address.”

Also read: Kashmir Press Club recognition, land allotment cancelled; J&K govt takes charge

Shakir Mir, a young journalist, said that he would always miss hanging out with friends at the Kashmir Press Club, “fraternizing with the wider journalist community in the Valley, sharing information, exchanging views, socialising, acquiring new perspectives and learning more on ideation and structuring stories.”

Mirza Waheed, a renowned Kashmiri novelist based in the United Kingdom, took to Twitter to express his angst at the developments. “A day after a journalist staged a ‘coup’ at the Kashmir Press Club, an independent elected body of journalists from across the region, the state takes over the building, sealing it off. Quite stunning.”

Support pours in

All major media bodies like the Editors Guild of India, Press Club of India, Mumbai Press Club of India, Press Club of Kolkata, Delhi Union of Journalists and many others have expressed solidarity with Kashmiri journalists.

“We are aghast at the manner in which the office and the management of Kashmir Press Club, the largest journalists’ association in the Valley, was forcibly taken over by a group of journalists with the help of armed policemen,” the Editors Guild of India said in a statement.

The Press Club of Kolkata stated that “organisations of professionals should totally be left in the hands of the members of that particular professional fraternity.”

Meanwhile, Jammu and Kashmir’s oldest political group, the National Conference, too stepped in to deplore “the forcible takeover and subsequent closure of the Kashmir Press Club.” Imran Nabi Dar, party’s spokesperson, said that the latest measure was a “milestone in dismantling all insignias of democracy.”

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“The government’s order of closing KPC should not be seen in isolation, rather a part of a battery of assaults which started after the illegal abrogation of Articles 370/35A. This act is just culmination of a policy which started with putting the registration of the club in abeyance and then the forceful takeover. Dropping all pretence the government has finally bolted the club. It is deplorable to see how the government could stoop so low to even scavenge the leftovers of democracy in Kashmir,” Dar said.