An official spokesman today said that around 70 media-persons including 21 editors, 44 accredited journalists and 4 officials from Doordarshan and Radio were invited for the ‘At Home’ hosted by Governor N N Vohra at Convention Centre Jammu on 26 January 2017 in connection with the Republic Day celebrations.Responding to news items titled “Favoritism in invite list mars Governor’s At Home” published in Saturday edition of daily ‘State Times’, and ‘Accredited Journalists left, Unaccredited invited’ published in Sunday edition of the same newspaper, an official spokesman termed the contents as completely fictional and misleading smacking of some ‘personal grudge’.In a statement the official spokesman said there are presently 368 editors of approved newspapers/periodicals and 270 accredited journalists in the State and given various constraints, it has been a standard practice of the Government to invite restricted number of media-persons to VVIP events, while ensuring that every media organization gets due representation. “As there are more than one Correspondent and Photographer/Videographer accredited from a newspaper/news channel/news agency in the State, the Editors/News Heads are consulted by the Information Department to recommend name of one accredited Correspondent and one Photographer/Video journalist to be invited for such events and the same was done in this case as well,” he said.
The spokesman said while all the eminent editors and accredited journalists were invited by the Raj Bhavan for the ‘At Home’, regrettably, a gratuitous effort is being made by a section of the press to create an impression that the Department of Information was purportedly responsible for the ‘prominent personalities from the media and accredited correspondents’ being left out from the list of invitees. “The fact is that all the prominent and credible media personalities from the State were invited for the At Home and the list was finalized in consultation with the concerned editors,” he said and added that, however, some editors had pressed hard with the Information Department to arrange ‘At Home’ invitation cards for their family members as well. The Department expressed its inability to arrange invitation cards for the family members of these editors as there were instructions from the Raj Bhavan to restrict the number of invitees given the space constraints and inclement weather conditions. “Despite various constraints, three representatives of the said newspaper including its Printer, Publisher and Editor, Mr Raj Daluja, Principal Correspondent, Mr Vivek Sharma and Srinagar Bureau Chief Mr Ahmad Ali Fayyaz were included in the invitees list,” the spokesman said.
To set the records straight, the official spokesman said that the list of editors to whom the invitation cards for ‘At Home’ were sent by the Raj Bhavan included Mr Raj Daluja (Editor, State Times), Mr Kamal Rohmetra (Editor, Daily Excelsior), Mr Prabodh Jamwal (Editor, Kashmir Times), Mr Arun Joshi (Resident Editor, The Tribune), Mr Fayaz Ahmad Kaloo (Editor, Greater Kashmir), Dr Shujaat Bukhari (Editor, Rising Kashmir), Mr Vicky Mahajan (Editor, Himalayan Mail), Mr Bansi Lal Gupta (Editor, Early Times), Mr Bashir Ahmad Bashir (Editor, Srinagar Times), Capt Murti Gupta (Editor, Greater Jammu), Mr Amit Sawhney (Editor, Journey Line), Mr Masood Hussain (Editor, Kashmir Life), Syed Iqbal Qazmi (Editor, Daily Udaan), Mr Abhimanyu Sharma (Resident Editor, Dainik Jagran), Mr Zafar Choudhary (Editor, The News Now), Mr Gurjeet Singh (Editor, The Latest), Mr Sohail Kazmi (Editor, Daily Taskeen), Mr Aditya Malhotra (Editor Kashmir Images Jammu), Mr Kuldeep Gupta (Editor, Daily Imarat), Begum Imrana Simnani (Editor, Daily Sandesh) and Mr Suresh Magotra (Editor, Daily Mandate).
Similarly, the accredited journalists who were invited by the Raj Bhavan for ‘At Home’ included Mr Vivek Sharma (Principal Correspondent, State Times), Mr Ahmad Ali Fayyaz (Srinagar Bureau Chief, State Times), Mr Anil Bhat (PTI), Mr Mohammad Aslam (KNS), S Satnam Singh (Dainik Jagran), Mr Sanjeev Pargal ( Daily Excelsior), Mr Mohit Kandhari (The Pioneer), Ms Suchismita (Kashmir Times), Mr Sominder Koul ( ANI), Sheikh Zffar Iqbal (NDTV), Mr Vijay Malla (KIP), Mr Ashwani Kumar (Aaj Tak), Mr Ajay Bachloo ( Star News), S Pradeep Dutta (Times Now), Mr Raju Kerni (Zee News), Mr Sameer Ji Bhat (ETV),Mr Ravi Khajuria (Hindustan Times), Mr Faheem Tak (Take One Channel), Mr Vishal Bharti (UNI),Mr Raman Saini (India TV), Mr Arun Sharma (Indian Express), Mr Naresh Baghat (Early Times),Mr Shahnawaz Khan (News Nation), Mr Yogesh Sagotra (Greater Kashmir), Mr Naresh Kumar (Hind Samachar), Dr Balram Saini (Punjab Kesri), Mr Vinod Sharma (Gulistan/JK Channel), Mr Amit Kumar Verma (Amar Ujala), Mr Mohit Gupta (Nav Jammu), Syed Amjad Shah (Rising Kashmir), Mr Nitin Kanotra (Hindustan Times), Mr Channi Anand (Associated Press), Mr J P Bandral (EPA), Mr Afzal Shah (Udaan), Mr Darshan Kumar ( NDTV), Mr Rajnish Parihan (P-7 News Channel), Mr Rajendra Arora ( News Point), Mr Saleem Pandit (Times of India), Mr Rashid Rahi (CNS), Mr Dinesh Manhotra (The Tribune), Mr Sanjay Sharma (Times of India), Mr Ashok Pahalwan (Scoop News), Mr Sandeep Bhat (Early Times) and Mr Mohammad Moazzam (Kashmir Reader).
The spokesman said that even from the official media, the list of invitees to restricted to four with Ms Anjali Sharma (Station Director Radio Kashmir Jammu), Mr Ravi Kumar Sharma (Programme Head Doordarshan Jammu), Mr Sanjeet Khajuria (Dy Director RNU DDK Jammu) and Ms Neha Jalali (Dy Director RNU Radio Kashmir Jammu) being invited for the ‘At Home’.Going by the list of invitees, the spokesman said that it becomes amply clear that despite space constraints and to last minute changes in the venue of the ‘At Home’ due to inclement weather, all the prominent journalists, representing cross section of the media in J&K, were included in the list, ‘except the family members of some editors.’“As such using indecorous phraseology in the news item like ‘putting the cards on sale’ and ‘resorting to favoritism’ vis-à-vis the invitees from the media fraternity, seems to be outlying the real journalistic ethics for the reasons best known to the editor of the said newspaper,” he said and added that it would be highly appreciated, that instead of indulging in sustained obscure outbursts, if the newspaper enlightens its esteemed readers on who among the list of invitees it thinks is insignificant/non-accredited and should have not been invited for the Át Home’.