Journalist Aasif Sultan who was arrested last month by the police has been sent to judicial custody till September 22.
His lawyer Shafaat Mir said that a court in Srinagar while hearing his bail plea sent him to judicial custody at Srinagar Central Jail.
Sultan, who works with a local news magazine, was formally arrested last week after “six-day detention” at a police station in Batmaloo area of Srinagar.
Several journalists’ bodies including ‘Reporters Without Borders’ and International Federation of Journalists” have called for his immediate release.
Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) has called for “immediate and unconditional” release Aasif, who has been held by the police in Srinagar “in violation of all criminal procedure rules for the past ten days”
“Detaining a journalist without any serious evidence to support the charges against him is unacceptable,” said Daniel Bastard, the head of RSF’s Asia-Pacific desk, in a statement.
“We call on the Jammu and Kashmir authorities to order Aasif Sultan’s immediate release, to drop all charges and to take measures against the Srinagar police officers responsible for his arbitrary detention. Allowing journalists to express different viewpoints will help to defuse tension in the Kashmir Valley,” Daniel added.
The RSF statement said Sultan, 31, was arrested on the night of 27 August when around 50 policemen descended on his home in Srinagar, the Kashmir capital, searched it and then took him away to a police station.
“His editor said he has been subjected to a great deal of violence, including being hit in the face, in an attempt to get him to explain his political ideology,” it said.