Some new and shocking developments have emerged out of the entire row of NewsClick, which is under the scanner of the Enforcement Directorate(ED). As per the latest revelation, through the laundered money of 30 crore rupees, the media house used to pay to people like Gautam Navlakha – the Maoist who is in jail in the Bhima Koregaon case – and a member of the IT cell of CPI(M).
Gautam Navlakha was paid 20.53 lakh rupees by NewsClick from the laundered money, and now ED will investigate him in this case. “Navlakha was also being paid money from the amount that was received. He is in jail so we will soon seek permission from the court to examine him in this case,” said a person involved in the investigation.
Moreover, Bappaditya Singh, who is a member of the CPI IT cell and manages the accounts of many senior leaders, was paid 52.09 lakh rupees by NewsClick. “Singh, who is also a shareholder in NewsClick was being given a huge amount of the money that was flowing from abroad, which we suspect was used for maintaining social media handles of CPI(M),” ThePrint quoted the source above.
A few days ago, when the first raid was conducted on NewsClick and its founding editor, Prabir Purkayastha’s office, the liberals were crying foul of media freedom, ignoring the financial crime angle. As per the ED, the companies which transferred 30 crore rupees to NewsClick have been traced to the United States and are probably shell companies.
“There is no credible source for these remittances that were paid over a period of two years. In the raids conducted in the last three days and our investigation, we seized a lot of data that shows how this money was received. The money received could be more than this, it is under investigation,” a source in the ED said.
“The money has come from several companies but nothing is traceable. These are all chartered accountant companies having the same office address in Illinois, USA,” the source added.
After the raids were conducted, the usual suspects like the Press Club of India, Editors Guild of India, The Wire, The Quint, and the unemployed left-liberal journalists termed the ED raids as an attack on press freedom, even before going into merits of the case. Press Club of India called it an “unsavoury attack on the media in a bid to intimidate and silence critical journalism.” The statement pointed out that NewsClick has “closely covered” the ongoing farmers’ protests at Delhi’s borders, and “specialises in reports on government policies on the poorer sections of society”.
“Editors Guild of India is concerned about ED raids at the office of http://NewsClick.in, and residences of its senior journalists and officials. EGI is concerned that raids by government agencies are not used as coercive measures to suppress free and independent journalism,” said Editors Guild of India.
The left-liberal media establishment of India is the epitome of hypocrisy. The people in this establishment take ‘high moral ground’ in front of the camera. Be it on women empowerment, eve-teasing, transparency in businesses, a crackdown on black money so on and so forth. But when it comes to adhering to these principles in personal life or office environment, they violate almost every rule of these principles. In 2018, The Quint was caught in money-laundering and this time it is NewsClick. The liberals were crying about media freedom at the time of the raid on The Quint and this time too it is business as usual.
