GUWAHATI, March 25: The journalists community covering the proceedings of the on-going budget session of the Assam Assembly yesterday expressed resentment over the House admitting a privilege motion against a local editor, with the scribes writing to Speaker Ganesh Kutum to review the matter especially over some remarks by members generalising the community as a whole.The privilege motion was tabled by Dilip Kumar Saikia and eight others, all belonging to the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), who pointed out to a news item published in a recent issue of the ir Batori, a local vernacular daily, which pertained to the recent reported meeting of Assam Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta with Bharatiya Janata Party president L K Advani. Elaborating on the matter, Dilip Kumar Saikia and several other legislators complained that the said news item had lowered the prestige of the leader of the House, and particularly asked the Speaker to pull up Atanu Bhuyan, the executive Editor of the newspaper, who had written thenews item under his by-line.Saikia also asked the Speaker to make Bhuyan prove the contents of the said item, especially about Mahanta ``touching'' the feet of Advani, and even said that the journalist should bring the BJP leader to the House as an witness.The MLA said that journalists were in the habit of black-mailing the people. Another MLA Jagadish Bhuyan (AGP) said that the journalists had crossed the limits, while Allauddin Sarkar (CPI) said the yellow journalism was in full swing in the state. Even as Ganesh Kutum referred the matter to the privilege committee of the Assembly, the journalists present in the press gallery sent a letter to him complaining that some members had passed general remarks against the journalists.The journalists in their letter to the speaker also requested him to direct Dilip Kumar Saikia (AGP) to publish the names of journalists who were allegedly into blackmailing, and complained that the legislators had taken undue advantage of the privilege motion to castigate thejournalists community as a whole.
