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New Delhi: This afternoon, barely two days after digital media journalist Dilwar Hussain Mozumder was released by a local court in Guwahati, the Assam police arrested his brother Taibur Rahman Mozumder in his home town Hojai on the charge of land-grabbing, PTI reported.

No sooner did the news spread, chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma spoke about it to the local press.

What he said to the press about the family of the journalist, who was put behind bars this past week while covering serious allegations of financial bungling at a co-operative bank of which Sarma is director, speaks volumes.

That is, if you take into account the voting that would take place in two of the state’s districts tomorrow (April 2) to re-elect an autonomous council.

The chief minister told reporters in Biswanath district:

“That so-called Dilwar’s brother is an established land grabber; he was arrested earlier too, in 2021. He is a teacher [in a government school], even after the police had filed the chargesheet in the case, the state government didn’t sack him. So you can see that they have spread their tentacles so deep, also into the government. Even that Dilwar is a dumper vyapari [trader]; he has no attributes of a journalist; ask anyone in Hojai, they will tell you that the entire family is known for land-grabbing.”

The Wire couldn’t immediately get through to Assam police to gather more details of the charges against Mazumder’s brother.

The Kachua police station that detained him on April 1 has not given any formal statement on the matter yet.

Also, whether a chargesheet filed against a person (not a conviction by a court for........

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