A senior Assamese journalist was arrested on Tuesday in Guwahati under the SC/ST Act, hours after he was detained following a protest against alleged financial irregularities in a cooperative bank.
As per the arrest memo, Dilwar Hussain Mozumdar, who works for digital portal The Crosscurrent, has been accused of using “offensive” and “derogatory” remarks such as “Boro jati hoi tumi besi kora (loosely translated as “You Boro people are too much)”. He has also been booked for alleged criminal intimidation under Section 351 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
The arrest memo did not state who the complainant in the matter was.
According to media reports, Mozumdar was covering a protest by the Assam Jatiya Parishad's youth wing Jatiya Yuva Shakti outside the Assam Cooperative Apex Bank Limited’s headquarters in Panbazar in Guwahati.
Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma is the director of Assam Cooperative Apex Bank and BJP MLA Biswajit Phukan is its chairman.
During their protest on Tuesday afternoon, Jatiya Yuva Shakti alleged that the bank had been functioning without a formal contract with any IT vendor since June 2024 leading to concerns over operational stability and security risks for account holders, Hindustan Times reported. The protesters also accused the bank management of escalating the costs of infrastructure contracts from Rs 28 crore in 2018 to nearly Rs 50 crore in 2025.
Accusing the state government of not taking action against the bank for alleged irregularities, the Jatiya Yuva Shakti sought an impartial probe.
Mozumdar, who was covering the protest, was reportedly summoned to the Panbazar police station and subsequently detained.
While covering the protests, Mozumdar had questioned the bank’s managing director Dombaru Saikia. A video clip, shared by The CrossCurrent with Newslaundry, shows Mozumdar asking Saikia to answer questions about the allegations outside the bank premises. The video then shows Saikia asking the journalist to come to his office upstairs.
“Strangely, as he was leaving the bank, Mozumder got a call from the Panbazar police station, asking him to report at once. Upon reaching there, he was detained,” Arup Kalita, editor of The CrossCurrent told The Wire.
The CrossCurrent has earlier reported stories critical of the BJP government and CM Himanta Biswa Sarma.
Last year in February, in collaboration with The Wire, The CrossCurrent had reported on Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma allegedly spending “crores” of public money to “charter flights for BJP activity and weddings”. In 2022, the two outlets had reported on Sarma’s wife Riniki Bhuyan Sarma’s firm allegedly bagging “urgent” supply orders for personal protective equipment (PPE) kits while he was the state health minister.
Statements from press groups
The Press Club of India issued a detailed statement condemning the Assam police’s “high-handedness”. It said it stood in solidarity with a protest against the arrest being held by the Guwahati Press Club.
Elaborating the circumstances under which Mozumdar was arrested, the PCI slammed the police’s “refusal to inform his family and his colleagues on what grounds he was detained in the first place”.
The Press Club of India stands in solidarity with the Guwahati Press Club's protest being held today against the arrest of senior digital media journalist Dilawar Hussain Mozumder by Assam Police post midnight on March 26.
— Press Club of India (@PCITweets) March 26, 2025
We condemn the Assam Police's highhandedness in the… pic.twitter.com/YrWcg5X6Cl
“Preventing a journalist from carrying out his official duty is a grave infringement of the freedom of the press that is guaranteed under Article 19(1)(A) of the Constitution,” it said.
It urged the Assam government and CM Sarma to “look into the matter with all sincerity, and ensure that the state police respect the true spirit of the SC/ST Act, while also taking into consideration that there must not be any false charges lodged against a reporter who belongs to a backward, minority community, and was covering a sensitive corruption-related protest as part of his routine job”.
The Editors Guild of India demanded that the Assam administration “urgently clarify the circumstances that led to Mr Mozumdar’s detention”, stating that “at no cost any journalist anywhere should be unjustly held”.
EGI Statement on Arrest of Journalist in Assam pic.twitter.com/doMVeVUrqq
— Editors Guild of India (@IndEditorsGuild) March 26, 2025
“The detention of a journalist while on duty is deeply disturbing. While the media is duty-bound to report fairly and responsibly, it is equally the responsibility of the Assam government to ensure that journalists can carry out their work without intimidation or obstruction,” the statement said. “At a time when press freedom is perceived to be under siege across the country, this incident raises serious concerns about media suppression.”
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