Journalists express concern about growing intolerance of state functionaries.
NEW DELHI: The arrest of Guwahati-based journalist Dilwar Hussain Mazumder by Assam police, who was detained while investigating corruption in a local bank with ties to BJP leaders in influential positions, has sparked questions within party circles and among some sections of the RSS which is known for respecting critical journalism.
Many are now questioning how Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma’s handling of the situation has put the party in a difficult position.
Mazumder, a reporter with the CrossCurrent, a news portal, and assistant general secretary of the Guwahati Press Club was arrested on Tuesday late night on charges of violating sections of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities Act, 189) and was later granted bail by the Kamrup (Metro) Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) Court in Guwahati on Wednesday.
However, even before he could come out from prison, he was arrested again on Thursday. Later, on Friday, he was given bail in the second case too.
The two arrests stemmed from his involvement in covering a protest which was focused on allegations of corruption within the Assam Cooperative Apex Bank (ACAB).
On Tuesday, Mazumder had conducted an interview with the bank’s Managing Director Dambaru Saikia during the protest, which was organized in response to claims of financial mismanagement at the state-run cooperative bank. The protest specifically pointed to a Rs 50-crore scam allegedly involving top officials of the bank, including Saikia and the bank’s chairman Biswajit Phukan, a sitting BJP MLA.
Chief Minister Sarma is the Director of the said bank. The home department is also under him.
The core of the corruption allegations centers on significant irregularities in the bank’s financial operations.
Mazumder’s arrest came after he was summoned to the Panbazar police station for questioning following the protest. The journalist was detained for several hours before being charged under Section 351(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and Section 3(1)(r) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (Amendment 2015). The charges originated from an FIR lodged by Shishupal Boro, a security guard at the bank, although specifics regarding the allegations remain unclear. The Sunday Guardian has accessed a copy of the arrest document.
The second arrest was made on the complaint filed by bank Managing Director, Dombaru Saikia as per Mazumdar’s lawyers.
In this FIR, the MD, Saikia, whom Mazumder had approached for a comment, has alleged that the journalist unlawfully entered the first floor of the bank and attempted to take away documents.
On Wednesday, journalists gathered outside the Guwahati Press Club and the courthouse, condemning the arrest and calling it an attack on press freedom. The Press Club of India and other media organizations including Arunachal Pradesh Union of Working Journalists (APUWJ), Shillong Press Club have also voiced their strong concerns as this is not the first time that police force is being used in Assam to intimidate journalists.
The Tuesday protest after which Mazumdar was arrested was organized by Chaandropol Baruah, general secretary of the All Jatiya Party (AJP) youth wing.
Speaking to the Sunday Guardian Baruah said that the financial irregularities in the bank have been continuing for a long time and despite multiple complaints to various authorities and media highlighting it, no action has been taken to save the bank from corrupt people.
In January, the Central Vigilance Commission was informed about the alleged financial irregularities in the bank by account holders.
In the said letter, accessed by the Sunday Guardian the details about the alleged irregularities were explained in detail.
According to the allegations, the Assam Cooperative Apex Bank underwent digital transformation with the shift to the CBS platform in 2010, completing full integration by 2013. At that time, a private company Tulip managed the CBS project under a contract worth around 19.50 crores, with Infrasoft Pvt. Ltd. as the software provider.
After Tulip’s dissolution between 2014 and 2015, another private entity, Infrasoft assumed full control until 2017. Later, fresh tenders were issued, and Inspira was selected as the new System Integrator, with the contract value at Rs 28 crores, covering Infrasoft’s software, hardware, and five years of maintenance services. KPMG was hired as a consultant, receiving approximately Rs 3 crores over five years, the letter to CVC had stated.
By 2023, both the agreement with Inspira and the contract with Infrasoft expired. However, due to unresolved financial considerations for select Board members, no new contract was signed, leading to delays. By June 2024, the bank had been operating on auto-pilot mode, threatening the stability of the entire system and the financial security of Assam’s citizens.
The letter claimed that the Board of Directors, led by Chairman Biswajit Phukan and Managing Director Dombaru Saikia, manipulated the tender restructuring to secure personal gains. The revised tender, totaling Rs 48 crores, includes Rs 28 crores for hardware, Rs 14 crores for maintenance, and Rs 6 crores for software, with an additional Rs 4 crores allocated to KPMG. This marks an 80% increase from the 2018 contract value of Rs 28 crores to nearly Rs 50 crores by 2025.
The letter has further claimed that evidence indicates that KPMG, under pressure from the Chairman and MD, helped facilitate a questionable financial transaction worth approximately Rs 15 crores. Despite NABARD’s representation on the Board, no objections were raised to this significant price escalation.
The said letter was also copied to Chief Minister, Chief General Manager, Regional Office, Guwahati, NABARD, Managing Director, NABARD, Head Office – Mumbai, Regional Director, Reserve Bank of India, Guwahati and Additional Director General of Police, Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption, Assam.
Apex Bank had come under scanner in 2023 after it emerged that Rs 20.3 crore were paid by the bank in illegal transactions between April 2020 and June 2020 with entities linked to Rajesh Bajaj, a figure previously involved in the Saradha chit fund scandal who was grilled by the CBI in August 2014. These payments, made between April and June 2024, were allegedly disguised as “Demand Bill Purchases”, a practice prohibited by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). When the matter became public, the bank had announced that it would ask the Bureau of Investigation Economic Offences (BIEO) of Assam Police to investigate the case.
More significantly, on 3 March, Shantanu Gogoi, ACS Deputy Secretary to the Government of Assam Cooperation Department, in a letter (available with the Sunday Guardian) marked as ‘most urgent’ wrote to the Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Assam on the financial
The Sunday Guardian reached out to Gogoi and Narayan Konwar, IAS, the recipient of the said letter for a response on this. No response was shared till the time the story went to press.
Emails sent to Apex bank MD Saikia for a response by the Sunday Guardian too did not elicit a response.
Speaking to The Sunday Guardian, Susmita Goswami, president of the Assam Press Club said that they strongly condemned the arrest of Mazumdar by Guwahati Police. “Hundreds of journalists who gathered at the Press Club expressed concern about the growing intolerance of the state functionary against journalists to carry out their fundamental duties. A protest programme against the arrest was held at the Press Club premise on Wednesday. Immediate release of Mazumdar was demanded by the meeting. The meeting also demanded that harassment of journalists should immediately stop and the matter of repeated harassment of scribes on duty will be brought to the notice of the highest authorities,” she said.
On Thursday, Chief Minister Sarma questioned whether Mazumder can be called a journalist, while adding that the Assam government does not officially recognise people working in online news portals as journalists.
“Legacy media is recognised as journalists by the Assam government. But YouTube channels, portals – the recognition of these is just something that is being discussed. A decision has not been made on this… We don’t register them, we don’t give them advertisements, we don’t give them ID cards. So this person does not come under the Assam government’s understanding of journalism,” he said. He also alleged that Mazumdar should be considered a businessman and claimed that he owns a dumper business.
He also stated that Mazumder was not arrested on journalism-related charges.
“He went to a bank, he is not even a journalist… He might have gone for personal work; no one can say… If a journalist goes and fights with someone, will he not be arrested?… We will not arrest you for any write-up. If you write something against me, you will not be arrested for that… The freedom that journalists have is for writing, but what they go and speak about in an office; that is a different issue,” he said.
The CM also posted a statement on X, stating: “I would like to clarify that Assam police has not arrested any journalist in recent times.”
However, the editor of ‘CrossCurrent’, Arup Kalita, stated that Mazumdar’ has been working as a journalist for more than ten years in different organisations and he was the Assistant General Secretary of the Guwahati Press Club.
“He joined DY 365 (an Assamese satellite news channel) in 2011 and worked there for a long time. He joined us in 2022, and then in the middle, he also worked in another organisation and rejoined us again just about a month ago. He is also an elected office bearer of the Guwahati Press Club. So the Chief Minister saying that he is not a journalist doesn’t mean much,” Kalita told the local media.
Press Club of India on Friday issued another statement while condemning Sarma to
“define who is a legitimate journalist” and expressed concern that attempt was made to shift the attention from the issue of preventing journalist from carrying out his official duty and infringing freedom of press.