The Digital Security Act is nothing but to deny the press freedom or freedom of expression altogether. This law is insulting for the profession of journalism inasmuch as the journalists will be under the watch of big police brother. Their computers etc. can be seized and taken away. It is the worst thing that can happen to journalists to cede to the police the editorial power over the media.
First, the government passed the controversial ICT Act. Now the government has come up with more drastic a law called Digital Security Act. The journalists are saying they have been duped by reintroducing section 57 of ICT Act in the new Act under a different guise.
The frightening purpose of such laws is clear. Already under the revoked section 57 of the ICT Act more than 700 cases are pending against the media people waiting for trial.
Politically also, the government finds it easy to use police for starting hundreds of false police cases to suppress political dissent. The government is thus robustly depending on police power although the country has not yet become a police state. No concern is shown that the judicial process is not politics to be abused for political purposes.
The proposed digital law is ruthlessly sweeping covering wide ranging offences defined in vague terms authorising a police officer absolute power to arrest anybody and search any place any time without any court order. His computer and other essential equipment can be taken under police control in the name of investigation. No constitutional guarantee or the court process is of any us. The police must be obeyed. You cannot blame the police because it is the law of lawlessness.
Anybody who has any anxiousness to see any freedom to exist for the free people, will consider the Digital Security Act as madness of a law.
I have to say that the government has convinced itself that as a nation we are too timid and too self-serving and the government can have its way. There is no need for free election to be elected to power and govern us. What else remains for the government to worry about the Constitution or the law.
Previously, the journalists set the bad example of joining the government wholesale when the press freedom was denied altogether under BKSAL one party system. That lingering sense to be with the government still persists otherwise they could not be party activists of undemocratic parties so openly.·
The journalists have to show now that they have changed and are determined not to betray the people’s trust and give up their own professional dignity once again.
The Council of Editors are opposing the black law valiantly but helplessly. The government is under the firm belief that the journalists are disunited and morally weak. Many of them are political activists of the government. So the government is sure of their loyal and unyielding support however black digital act is.
It is unbelievable that any democratic minded government can think that journalists will not rise unitedly against the blatant police control over the enlightened journalists forming the fourth pillar of democracy. There will be no need of any protection before they can be sent to jail under the threat of heavy punishment. By throwing out a Chief Justice most humiliatingly before any guilt was proved the government has shown its intolerance to impartial justice.
As journalists they are in charge of the press freedom and by protecting this freedom they protect all other freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. The press freedom is the mother of all freedoms. The sanctity of responsibility and trust on journalists is so deep and so sacred.
The government being under the bureaucratic influence of police state, so let it be run by the police. But the media is a different world and the journalists cannot agree that the media to be run and controlled by the police. The idea of police state is death to press freedom.
We have the Press Council and the insistence of the media people should be that no police action is to be taken without first obtaining clearance from the Press Council. The Press Council is our controlling body under law.
But the journalists must solidly refuse to be under police control. The government must be made aware that it cannot defy the people’s fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution and be legitimately in power.
The media must survive as the voice of the people, free and bold, or not at all.
