GUWAHATI
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma cited police reports to say Dilwar Hussain Mozumder, the arrested chief reporter of news portal The CrossCurrent, demanded a huge amount as a loan from the Assam Cooperative Apex Bank in Guwahati, apart from abusing a man belonging to a Scheduled Tribe (ST) community.
He told journalists on Thursday (March 27, 2025) that Mozumder is a businessman who works part-time at the portal owned by a politician and that his arrest had nothing to do with his professional work.
He also said the State government has not yet recognised people who work in portals as journalists.
“We don’t give them registration, advertisements, and ID cards. So, this person does not come under the definition of journalist as far as the State government is concerned. We consider only those who work in electronic and print media as journalists,” the Chief Minister said.
“According to the police report, he treated a man from an ST community badly. The second report is that he demanded a huge amount as a loan from the bank for his business,” the Chief Minister said.
“I know him [Mozumder] as an owner of four to five dumpers and has other businesses. We don’t know if his arrest was business-related or if it was for other reasons,” he said, adding that the allegedly abused tribal man’s statement was recorded in a court on Thursday.
Mr. Mozumder was granted bail on Wednesday. The Chief Minister said he would be arrested in two to three other cases registered against him. None of the cases is connected to journalism, he asserted.
“We don’t know why he went to the bank. The media has to listen to both parties,” Mr. Sarma said, referring to the protest by journalists following Mr. Mozumder’s arrest.
Mr. Mozumder was arrested while covering a protest staged by the Jatiya Yuva Shakti, the youth wing of the political party Assam Jatiya Parishad, against alleged financial irregularities in the bank.
The Press Club of India on Wednesday said, “When the bank’s managing director Dambaru Saikia arrived at the scene, Mozumder approached him and asked him if he could reply to his questions. Saikia could be heard on camera asking him to come to his office upstairs, which Mozumder did. However, on coming out of the bank, he received a call on his phone from the Pan Bazar police station, asking him to report. On arrival, he was detained.”
The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, defines the following: ‘publisher of news and current affairs content’ means an online paper, news portal, news aggregator, news agency and such other entity called by whatever name, which is functionally similar to publishers of news and current affairs content, but shall not include newspapers, replica e-papers of the newspaper and any individual or user who is not transmitting content in the course of systematic business, professional or commercial activity.”
Local media organisations did not immediately react to the Chief Minister’s observation about Mr. Mozumder.
