Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 7: The Press Club of Jammu Management Committee has appealed to the Jammu and Kashmir Government particularly the Information Department to cut short a long list of formalities sought for Accreditation of journalists/video journalists/ freelance journalists/photographers and all others categories.
In its meeting held today under the chairmanship of Press Club of Jammu president Sanjeev Pargal and attended by entire Management Committee including Dinesh Manhotra, Secretary General, Zorawar Singh Jamwal, Vice President, Channi Anand, Secretary Finance; Vishal Bharti, Nishikant Khajuria, Deepak Khajuria, Dinesh Mahajan, Ajay Meenia, Kunal Shrivatsa and Govind Chouhan, all Members, it was observed that formailites asked for Accreditation of journalists should be cut short to facilitate the scribes to apply for it.
The Management Committee observed that Accreditation can be renewed in favour of all those who were already holding it till 2020 when the annual renewal process was stopped by the Information Department as such journalists fulfil all preconditions and formalities.
“As far as the grant of accreditation to new journalists/photo journalists etc is concerned, a limited set of formalities can be sought and not too many which are beyond the compliance of many scribes,” the Management Committee said.
The Press Club of Jammu was of the view that senior journalists including the Press Club of Jammu Management Committee, which is the only elected body of the journalists in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, should have been taken into confidence by the Government as well as Information Department before issuing new Accreditation Rules and a long list of formalities to be submitted along with the application.
The Management Committee was of the view that it is better that the Information Department keeps Accreditation suspended like it has done for past three years instead of asking for large number of formalities which the always busy journalists in Jammu and Kashmir are unable to comply with.
Noting that such a long list of formalities was never asked for in the past, the Management Committee asserted that earlier also the Information Department used to renew Accreditation every year in March and grant new Acreditations based on seeking limited set of formalities which were easy to fulfil by the scribes.
The Management Committee expressed confidence that the Jammu and Kashmir Government as well as the Information Department, the Nodal Agency for dealing with Media Houses and journalists, would revisit the guidelines and act upon the suggestions of the Press Club of Jammu.
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