MUMBAI: NBF (News Broadcasters Federation) has condemned the attack by unidentified men on the Hyderabad office of TV5, by damaging equipment and property. 

"The attack on TV5 is yet another attempt at using physical violence and threats to try and muzzle the media. NBF strongly condemns this and expects the state government to ensure TV5 is able to continue broadcasting in an environment free of such strong-arm tactics which are anyway bound to fail," said NBF president Arnab Goswami.

TV5 has been at the forefront of reporting the high costs of procurement of Rapid Test Kits (RTE) for testing Covid2019 infection by the Andhra Pradesh government, which forced officials to cancel the contract and save crores of rupees to the public exchequer. More recently, TV5 has been highlighting and raising questions on the negligence that led to the gas leakage at a private chemical factory in Vijayawada.

Across India, broadcasters in all languages are doing non-stop programming with a focus on battling the pandemic and ensuring the success of the nationwide lockdown.

NBF, India’s largest industry association representing the combined interests of TV news channels, expressed concern over the increasing incidents of attacks on media and journalists, while performing their duty during these hard times. In the last few weeks, there have been an increasing number of physical attacks and filing of police cases against TV news channels, and prominent journalists across the country, creating an obstacle against performing their public service, despite the hardships during the lockdown of the country since March 24, 2020, NBF said in a press release. 

"Since the nationwide lockdown, at least 24 journalists have been booked under serious charges by the police department in various states. Some journalists have also been physically attacked. Such incidents are highly condemnable and demoralising for the journalists and the news broadcasting media," said NBF secretary-general R Jai Krishna.