New Delhi: All the 21 candidates of Gautam Lahri panel have registered a big win in the Press Club of India election held here Saturday. The result was declared on Sunday.
Senior journalist Gautam Lahiri (President), Sangeeta Pisharoty, a woman journalist of The Wire (Vice President), Neeraj Thakur of The Probe (General Secretary), Afzal Imam of Nav Bharat (Joint Secretary) and Mohit Dubey (Treasurer), and all other 16 candidates of the panel’s managing committee have won.
The Gautam Lahri panel asked for a vote on the achievements of the past year, and future plans, media freedom and protection of the rights of working journalists, while the opposition called for change. The President-elect Gautam Lahiri, in his victory speech, expressed his deep gratitude to all for electing him as president of PCI for the fourth time.
Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty, National Affairs Editor with The Wire, who has won as Vice President of PCI told Radiance, “I am extremely happy to be the vice president of India’s oldest press club as very few women have won the post in its over 50 years’ history. Additionally, the huge margin with which our panel has won today also signals the fact that journalists want us to stick to our primary promise of protecting media freedom. Since Emergency, India has not seen such an attack on Press freedom and the right of the fourth estate to question the government of the day on behalf of the people, an important feature of a democracy. The mandate given to us today is to stand up to it.”
The 16-member managing committee of the PCI this time includes Ashraf Ali, editor-in-chief of Asia Times, Ashish Gupta of Asomiya Prati Din, former senior journalist of PTI Amitabh Roy Chowdhury, Meghna Dhulia of Times of India, Muhammad Azad of Univarta, Azad Journalist NR Mohanty, Independent Journalist Pragya Singh, NDTV’s Aditi Rajput, Times of India’s Anand and Chatto Padhyay, PR Sunil Malayalam Live , CNN News18’s Ravinder Kumar, News18’s Shankar Kumar Anand, Independent Journalist, Sunil Negi, The Caravan’s Sarbhi Kanga, Bipa Suresh Babu, South India Times and All India Radio’s Abhishek Kumar Singh have been successful.
