Bhubaneswar: A police case has been filed against some members of a crowdfunded fact-finding team of the Editors’ Guild of India, who went to Manipur to look into the media’s reportage of the ethnic conflict. An FIR has been filed over allegations that the report submitted by the team was “false, fabricated and sponsored”
The state government has filed an FIR against the members of the Editors Guild who are trying to create more clashes in the state of Mapipur,” said Chief Minister N Biren Singh.
He added, ” I also give a warning to the members of the Editors Guild, if you want to do something, then do visit the spot, see the ground reality, meet the representatives of all communities and then publish what you found. Otherwise, meeting some sections only and coming to a conclusion is highly condemnable. The State government has filed an FIR against the members of the Editors Guild who are trying to create more clashes in the state of Manipur.”
The Editors Guild of India (EGI) in the report released on Saturday said there are clear indications that the leadership of the state beçame partisan during the conflict. “It should have avoided taking sides in the ethnic conflict, but it failed to do its duty as a democratic government which should have represented the entire state,” the report said.
Imphal-based social worker N Sarat Singh filed the first information report (FIR) against the three who came to Manipur from August 7 to 10 – Seema Guha, Sanjay Kapoor, and Bharat Bhushan. The EGI president has also been mentioned as an accused in the FIR.
The All Manipur Working Journalists Union, and the Editors’ Guild Manipur said they have taken strong exception to the “half-baked so-called fact-finding report, which was completed in merely four days.”
“The report has many contentions and wrong representations which are damaging to the reputation of the journalist community in the state, especially Imphal-based news outlets,” the Manipur journalists’ collective and the Manipur Editors’ Guild said in the statement.
The EGI in a post on X, formerly Twitter, accepted the error in its report and said it is “being rectified and an updated report will be uploaded shortly.” “… We regret the error that crept in at the photo editing stage,” the EGI said.
