Three Kerala-based journalists - Nisha Purushothaman, the Chief News Producer of Manorama News, Kamalesh KG, Principal Correspondent with Asianet News and Prajula Kamalesh, News Editor with Asianet News - have approached the police after they were harassed on social media by sympathisers of the Communist Party of India [CPI(M)]. These journalists, and others working with the two channels, have alleged that during the coverage of the pandemic, the gold smuggling case and the recent floods in the state, they have been targeted online and their families dragged in.
The row became bigger after Vineeth VU, a staff at Deshabhimani, the CPI(M) mouthpiece, posted a derogatory status on Nisha on his Facebook profile. Many others too have abused her on her account. While Nisha had filed a complaint in June 2020 regarding a Facebook id that harassed her then, lately she has been at the receiving end for an inadvertent error she made while anchoring a bulletin. Instead of saying that the shutters of the dams were opened, she said that the dams had collapsed.
Nisha reacted to the harassment saying, “The post by Vineeth VU is a continuation of the personal attacks by CPI(M) cyber team for quite a long time. What should I say about people who use my slip of tongue on a day when I had been anchoring continuously for five hours. A party that runs a TV channel and a newspaper is doing this to me. In this democratic country, I have the responsibility to ensure that people's rights are upheld. I will have to ask unpleasant questions to political leaders. This will continue. For the time being I am a journalist not a government public relations officer. Let us take pity on people who think that journalism is about praising others," Nisha said.
Nisha was alluding to a row that has been going on for days between the CPI(M) and sections of the media. While the CPI(M) has been alleging that they were being targeted by the media at the behest of the Congress and the BJP, many journalists have reiterated that it is their job to ask tough questions. The fact that a few of the channels had committed gaffes and reported certain news events wrongly, gave ammunition to those who were already targeting them, and this descended into more personal attacks.
Nisha added that the CPI(M) was a party that criticised the BJP and the RSS for intolerance. "This shows the hypocrisy of a party that claims to be liberal. I believe that this attack against me was with the full knowledge of the party," she said.
Asianet News Chief Reporter Kamlesh and wife Prajula too faced personal attacks following the channel's reporting on the gold smuggling case.
Since one of the main accused Swapna Suresh was working closely with the former Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, several allegations have been made linking her to the Chief Minister’s office. In recent press meets, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan lost his cool and questioned the media for linking him and the Chief Minister’s office to the smuggling. He repeatedly asked what evidence the media had and said that this kind of reporting was irresponsible. Since Kamalesh was one of the media persons asking questions to the Chief Minister there, posts targeting him appeared on social media.
Moreover, the CPI(M) has been at loggerheads with Asianet News and had declared a few days ago that it will boycott the channel’s prime time debates.
Kamalesh on Monday filed a police complaint against one such social media user. “We are also getting a lot of genuine criticism and feedback, we are okay with that. If we commit mistakes, people should point that out, maybe even troll us, but harassment is not okay,” a journalist who works with one of these channels told TNM.
Meanwhile, Left Democratic Front Convenor R Vijayaraghavan when asked about the targeted harassment denied that the party had asked anyone to do it. He later justified it saying that journalists had many times breached the privacy of others and broken the code of ethics.
CPI(M) leader and Deshabhimani editor P Rajeev also reacted to the controversy and said that Vineeth VU was a temporary staff at Deshabhimani and that his opinion has nothing to do with the newspaper’s ideology. P Rajeev also said that the party is against cyber bullying and has asked for an explanation from Vineeth.
On Monday, the Chief Minister also reacted saying that people should engage in healthy debates and not indulge in personal attacks. He said that he will look into the complaints about the harassment of journalists.