Manipur journalist detained under NSA says jail SP's statement claiming he met family, advocate is 'half-cooked' story

Imphal: The National Security Act (NSA) detainee, journalist Kishorechandra Wangkhem on Saturday said that the statement of the Manipur Central Jail Superintendent (SP) published by several media houses was “half-cooked and sugar-coated story”. On Friday, the Manipur Central Jail SP, S Touthang, had refuted Kishorechandra’s advocate claim of not allowing him to meet with his client and said that he left early before completing formalities. The Manipuri journalist, who was detained under NSA last month for criticising the BJP-led state government, spoke to the media persons on Saturday morning while he was on his way to the JNIMS Hospital for the medical checkup. [caption id=“attachment_5779841” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File photo of Kishorechandra Wankhem. ANI[/caption] “The Jail SP’s story is half cooked sugar-coated story,” Kishorechandra said. “If you want to see the realities come and stay with me at the jail just for one day and you will know the truth,” he added while alleging that the Jail authority collects money from the prisoners for providing water. Kishorechandra said that his arrest was arbitrary and the charges leveled against him were baseless “I strongly denounced my detention under NSA, this is an autocracy, dictatorial rule, they cannot simply arrest me for raising voice against them,” said the journalist while urging the people to raise their voice against the government. On Friday, the Manipur High Court had directed the state government, the Centre and District Magistrate of Imphal West, to submit a counter affidavit to the petition filed by Kishorchandra challenging his detention order before February 1 next year. Kishorchandra, who was working for a local news channel in the northeastern state had reportedly uploaded several videos last month calling Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh a puppet of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led central government. In his video clips, the journalist had apparently criticized the state government for observing Rani of Jhansi’s birth anniversary and allegedly used derogatory words against the Chief Minister. Kishorchandra was arrested on November 20, but he was released on November 26 following the order of the chief judicial magistrate, who observed that, “The words, terms and gesture used by the accused in the video cannot be termed as seditious. It is mere expression of opinion against the public conduct of public figure.” However, the next day he was picked up from his residence by the police and detained NSA. On December 14, the state government approved the detention order passed by the district magistrate, Imphal West and fixed the period of detention to be one year from the date of detention.