State Minister for Information and Broadcasting Mohammad Ali Arafat on Wednesday urged the country’s mass media to work with utmost sincerity safeguarding the interest of the country and its people, saying that the government is working to ensure a congenial atmosphere for journalism.
“The government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina always stands by the people working in the media with different types of incentives so they can work professionally with responsibility,” he said.
The state minister said this while addressing the Bangladesh Press Council (BPC) Padak-2023 distribution ceremony at Tathya Bhaban Auditorium in the city’s Circuit House Road on WEdnesday afternoon.
Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting Ministry Kazi Keramat Ali, Senior Secretary of the ministry Humayun Kabir Khandaker, and jury board chief and Professor of Dhaka University (DU) Mass Communication and Journalism Department Dr Abul Mansur Ahmed spoke at the function with BPC Chairman Justice Md Nizamul Huq Nasim in the chair.
Reiterating the government’s commitment to foster professional journalism, Arafat said, “We believe that freedom of the press is the part of our Liberation War spirit”.
The protection of democracy, human rights, freedom of expression and freedom of the press is the large part of the dream based on which the country was liberated, he said, adding, “But later, it was snatched from us after August 15 in 1975 following the assassination of the country’s architect and the greatest Bengali of all time Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman”.
Later, the country witnessed that the evil force came to the state power and pushed the country towards darkness by establishing military rule, killing democracy, suppressing mass media, gagging the freedom of expression, destroying the human rights and ruining all the spirits of the Liberation War while the reactionary and anti-liberation forces were rehabilitated, the state minister said.
From that reality, he said, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been trying to bring the country out of the darkness and push it towards light and the spirit of the Liberation War for the last 15 years since 2009.
Noting that the government of Bangabandhu’s daughter Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina welcomes all kinds of constructive criticism made by the media, Arafat said, “Today’s award is an evidence of that as one of the awardees got the award for his report criticizing the government”.
