Jammu (Jammu and Kashmir) [India], November 20 : A team of the Jammu and Kashmir Police's State Investigation Agency (SIA) conducted a raid on the Kashmir Times office in Jammu on Thursday.
Further details of the raid are awaited.
Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary asked the investigative agencies not to "pick-and-choose" media organisations for raids, saying there should not be any pressure on the press.
"The agencies are doing their work. If a raid has to be conducted, it should not be done on a pick-and-choose basis. If they have done anything wrong, action should be taken, but not just to create pressure. The Press is the fourth estate, and it should get space to practice journalism," Surinder Choudhary told reporters.
Youth Jammu and Kashmir People's Democratic Party (JKPDP) chief Aditya Gupta criticised the raid, calling the Kashmir Times the "boldest voice" of the Union Territory.
"Ved Bhasin, founder of Kashmir Times, built one of the boldest voices in J&K. A fearless, truthful, and impossible to silence. His daughter @AnuradhaBhasin_ carried that legacy forward with the same grit. For decades, the paper exposed some of Kashmir's biggest stories of human rights abuses, disappearances, governance failures, and major political shifts. Through every threat and every pressure, Kashmir Times stood unshaken, never bowing before the state and always standing by the truth," Gupta wrote on X.
The Kashmir Times was established in 1954 as the oldest English-language daily newspaper from Jammu and Kashmir by Anuradha Bhasin's father, Ved Bhasin.
Since 2023, the media firm has switched to a digital multimedia format, which replaced the previous print edition.
Anuradha Bhasin was also the petitioner in the landmark Anuradha Bhasin Vs Union of India case, in which the Supreme Court issued a judgment calling for internet shutdowns only for a temporary duration.
"The order is impermissible under the Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services (Public Emergency or Public Service) Rules, 2017. The suspension can be utilised for a temporary duration only," the judgment said.