AGARTALA, April 20 - In a stunning move, police raided the premises of Bengali Daily Syandan Patrika here last night in connection with a case filed by the Airport Authority of India (AAI).
The concerned FIR was transferred from the airport to West Agartala Police Station for jurisdictional reasons.
What documents the police party seized or recovered is not yet known, but as news of the raid spread like wildfire, the media here reacted sharply in protest as veteran Subal Dey, the Editor and owner of Syandan Patrika is known to be close to Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb and played a key role in installing the BJP government in the state in 2018.
Protesting against the raid, Pranab Sarkar, senior journalist and secretary of Agartala Press Club resigned from his position as member of the state media monitoring committee.
Superintendent of Police (West) Manik Das today said that the AAI authority had filed an FIR with Airport Police Station alleging a fraudulent publication of advertisement seeking applications for filling up some posts in airports.
�The AAI authority had filed a complaint under Sections 420, 468 and 471 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the case was transferred to West Agartala Police Station on jurisdictional ground. Police will proceed under provisions of law,� observed the SP.
In a press release, Agartala Press Club condemned the police raid in the newspaper office and warned the state government and police administration.
On the other hand, Tripura Newspaper Society (TNS), a common platform of newspapers published from the state, also vehemently condemned the police move.
�TNS condemns and protests the raid in a newspaper office. It is an attack on democracy. Raid in a newspaper office is against the spirit of healthy democracy. We do believe the police will show restraint while dealing with such issues,� said Arun Nath, joint convener of TNS in a statement here.
