Plea in Supreme Court seeking to treat journalists as frontline workers amid COVID-19

A fresh application has been filed in the Supreme Court in the suo motu petition regarding the management of COVID-19 in the country highlighting the situation of journalists and media personnel during the pandemic. 

The plea filed by Dr. Kota Neelima through Advocate Lubna Naaz and settled through senior advocate Salman Khurshid seeks directions to the Respondents to provide proper and adequate COVID treatment to the journalists and their families. 

It also seeks the court's direction to recognize all the journalists and media persons as 'frontline warriors" so that they can avail the benefits being extended to all such workers; and/or

"...there have been 253 deaths of journalists due to COVID-19 which have been verified and 93 death which are unverified between 1st April 2020 to 19th May 2021. The said list is not exhaustive," the plea said. 

"On an average, 4 deaths of journalists have taken place between 1st April 2020 to 19th May 2021. The data suggests that 34% of the deaths have occurred in the metro cities whereas 66% of the deaths have occurred in the smaller cities," the plea said further. The plea goes on to submit that despite writing a letter to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and requesting for media persons to be declared as frontline workers, the Central Government has not designated them for vaccine prioritization.

The plea seeks directions to the Centre and state governments for free treatment of journalists in private as well as government hospitals in this unprecedented time of pandemic and the reimbursement of their bills. It also urges the court to direct the government to not consider the differentiation between the accredited and non-accredited journalists, employed and free-lance, rural and urban, technicians and assistance be removed for the purpose of all the schemes being provided so that it is more inclusive. 

The  petitioner also asked for directions to be given to the government to include editorial staff, photographers, videographers, cameramen, technician, technical staff and all assistants in the definition of 'journalists and media persons'