Banerjee bashes Centre over threat of action against N Ram

Accusing the Centre of trying to throttle the voice of media by threatening to invoke Official Secrets Act against veteran journalist N Ram, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Wednesday flayed the Union government. "Media plays an important role in democracy. I strongly condemn threats by the BJP govt to one of India's most senior & respected editors, N Ram," said Banerjee said in a tweet.

"Invoking Official Secrets Act to threaten journalists is a shame. They cannot curb freedom & rights of the press as per their convenience," she added. The Union government earlier on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that documents related to the Rafale aircraft deal were stolen from the Defence Ministry and threatened The Hindu newspaper with the Official Secrets Act for publishing articles based on them.

Those who put documents on the Rafale deal in the public domain are guilty under the Official Secrets Act and the contempt of court, Attorney General K K Venugopal told a a three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi. An investigation into the theft is on, the attorney general said on a day the newspaper published another article on the fighter jet deal.

The bench, which also included justices S K Kaul and K M Joseph, was hearing a batch of petitions seeking a review of its December 14 verdict dismissing all the pleas against the deal inked by India to procure the French fighter jets.