2ND LEAD

New Delhi minister cancels press conference in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 October 2013, 17:44 GMT]
New Delhi Establishment’s External Affairs Minister Salman Kurshid, visiting Jaffna on Tuesday, cancelled the ‘press conference’ he had scheduled at a hotel room in Jaffna exclusively for the Indian media accompanying him, after protest by local media about its exclusion. Eight journalists from Indian mainstream media, including The Hindu, accompanied the minister to set opinion orchestration in India. New Delhi official in Jaffna, Suresh Menon, had earlier announced that the press conference was for Indian journalists. The minister responded to the local media protest by cancelling media meet with all, and thus he also escaped answering questions from the local media, news circles in Jaffna said.

Whatever the media in Jaffna was able to cover was what the minister had said in a meeting that was organized for distributing money to some war-affected families of Vanni.

In that meeting, the Indian officials who were found seated with the public, set the ‘lead’ for clapping, and the beneficiaries who had come were made to follow the ‘clapping’.

The Indian official ‘lead’ for clapping was particularly set when the minister was talking about the 13th Amendment.

Other than the beneficiaries, the general public in Jaffna ignored the New Delhi minister and his visit.



Chronology: