By Our Correspondent
BHUBANESWAR/NEW DELHI: With BJP leader Baijayant ‘Jay’ Panda’s wife Jagi Panda run OTV continued to patronise the claims made by the arrested IFS officer Abhay Pathak, his history cheater son, Akash and their mastermind, expelled BJD MLA from Gopalpur, Pradeep Panigrahy and downplaying the action by the State Government against them, ruling Party’s Rajya Sabha MP and National Spokesperson, Dr Sasmit Patra on Thursday asked the Odia TV Channel to stop biased reporting on such corrupted and fraud elements like Pathak and Panigrahy.
In a series of tweets, Dr Patra alleged that OTV opting biased reporting to misguide the investigation of Vigilance and Crime Branch along with ED and IT into the corruption empire.
“#OTV are you aware that there are hundreds of poor, displaced people who were cheated by a criminal falsely promising them jobs in Ganjam, fraudulently using his would-be son-in-law as a Fake MD of Tata Motors? Have you seen the FIR? For a change, report facts not fiction!,” BJD MP Dr. Sasmit Patra tweeted @sasmitpatra
“How do you #OTV, run such biased programs favouring a criminal who misappropriated money from poor, displaced people of Ganjam. Your programs portraying him as a sorry figure, supporting his claims are shocking & goes against very grain of journalistic ethos. #OTVBiasedReporting,” the MP asked.
“#OTV please tell us how to depict, portray & showcase a criminal as a hero on television. What’s your secret sauce of success in effectively projecting a fraud & forger as a person wronged before the unsuspecting viewers. Some skills you have there, that others shouldn’t learn!,” he added.
The under scanner MLA was arrested under Sections 419, 420, 467, 468, 469, 471, 120-B of the IPC and Section 66C/66D of IT Act as there is sufficient prima facie evidence against him in this case, the Crime Branch said.Earlier, Vigilance, the anti-corruption agency of the State Police had arrested IFS officer Abhay Kant Pathak and his son Akash Kumar Pathak, who are accused of amassing assets worth crores disproportionate to their known sources of income.
