AGARTALA: The Tripura High Court on Wednesday stayed the order of the West Tripura District Magistrate who stopped the publication of 40-year-old CPI(M) mouthpiece "Daily Deshar Katha" on technical grounds.
Tripura High Court Chief Justice Ajay Rastogi, after hearing a petition of the Daily Deshar Katha Trust (DDKT), stayed the order of the West Tripura District Magistrate. The Bengali language newspaper is expected to resume publication on Thursday.
West Tripura District Magistrate and Collector Sandeep Mahatme had on October 1 closed down the daily finding management related faults, Advocate General Arun Kanti Bhowmik told IANS.
The daily had started publication in 1978. DDKT's counsel Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya told the media that under the directions of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government, the District Magistrate violatd the law.
"We are considering filing a petition at the appropriate platform to take punitive action against the DM," said Bhattacharya, a former Advocate General of Tripura.
DDKT chairman Gautam Das said the Editors Guild of India, Press Club of India and many journalist bodies denounced the "most undemocratic decision" of the Tripura government.
"RNI also without varyfying the facts at the ground level withdraw the registration of the daily through an e-mail at 10 p.m. on October 1. This is also unprecedented in India," said Das.
Das said that since the BJP-IPFT (Indigenous People's Front of Tripura) government came to power in March, massive attacks had been unleashed on Left leaders and cadres.
"The circulation of 'Daily Deshar Katha' fell to 45,000 per day, leaving 1,000 vendors and hawkers jobless," he said, announcing that the vernacular daily would resume publication from Thursday.