CHENNAI: The Chennai Press Club, the major hub of journalists’ activity in the metro, is in the eye of a controversy over non-conduct of elections for over a decade. A cross-section of journalists, primarily comprising youngsters, has come together to float the ‘Chennai Press Club Retrieval Group’ with a view to ensuring conduct of fresh elections. The group, which has alleged that the club is being administered by unelected representatives, has convened a meeting on Sunday to discuss about its retrieval.
The last election for office bearers of the club was conducted in 1999. Since a petition was filed alleging malpractice during the elections, the duly elected office-bearers could assume charge only in 2001. At that time Pon Dhanasekaran and Sivakumar were elected president and general secretary respectively. The former has since resigned, while the latter moved abroad more than eight years ago. All but one elected officer bearer is no longer in control and an interim administration has been conducting the affairs of the club for many years.
The conflict over conducting fresh elections has seen allegations and counter allegations fly for over a decade. A case is also pending in a Chennai court.
“We just want the Press Club to have fair elections. The current administration has no right to be governing the club because, for one thing, almost all of them are co-opted members, and the term of an elected council according to bylaws is only two years,” said Haseef Muhammad, a young journalist representing the CPC Retrieval Group. “The club earns a huge revenue from renting out its premises and we need accountability,” he added.
“After the last set of elected office-bearers took charge in 2001, an election was due in 2003. But it was not held citing that a new building was being constructed. The premises was completed in 2005 but there has been no sign of an election,” alleged R Mohan, a senior journalist who had moved the court seeking fresh elections.
“Except for Geethapriyan, not a single member of the managing council is an elected member,” he pointed out.
A former office-bearer, requesting anonymity, alleged that a lot of fake journalists were being given membership. “Also accounts started to become very badly maintained and opaque,” he said.
These allegations notwithstanding, the court ruled in 2013 that elections should be held by January 27, and the results submitted before the court. But the interim administrators obtained a stay order.
Perumal alias Bharathi Tamilan, a co-opted joint secretary of the club, admitted that elections had not been held. “How can they be held when there is no positive cooperation and a litigation is on. Have these people (the ones making the allegations) done their jobs properly? I believe this is an internal matter to be discussed between journalists. But the last decade has seen them work towards creating enmity and nothing more,” he charged.
Denying irregularities, he said, “No genuine journalist who wants to become a member is denied membership, but there is a process. You cannot come in with 60 forms and ask us to give you membership cards. As for accounts, they are being put together and both the members’ list and audited accounts will be made public in the general body meeting to be held soon.” According to him the Retrieval Group was formed to “divert the credit for the good work done by the club.”
Commenting on the developments, senior journalist G C Shekhar said there were too many vested interests in the press club right now and there are questions about some of the office bearers. “How can a person who is not even in the country still be the secretary? We in the media constantly complain about election irregularities elsewhere, like in the BCCI, and yet, our own associations haven’t been shining examples. Something has to be done,” he said.
Same Story at Guild, MUJ
It is the same story at the Madras Reporter’s Guild, formed in the 1950s, where the last election was held in 2001. Its president R Rangaraj claimed that elections could not be held as the Guild did not have a place to call as its own for the past decade. “We had been working out of an old building in the Government Estate, which collapsed during rains in early 2000s. With it went most of the old records. We had been petitioning the government for a new building from which to operate from. Only two years ago, we moved to this building near Press Club but we have had to do the interior wiring and the air-conditioning, for which we had to raise funds,” he contended. Rangaraj promised to conduct elections in a few months after auditing accounts and restoring old records.
Likewise, the last election at the Madras Union of Journalists, the oldest journalist trade union in South India, was held in 2010. Its president Mohan claimed that the existing committee had been involved in planning the MUJ’s 60th anniversary celebrations and collecting and compiling old works of former journalists. “The executive committee has already decided to hold the elections this December and the new office bearers will assume charge from January 2016,” he said.