KARACHI, April 7: The South Asian Editors’ Forum (Saef) decided on Sunday that it would send a letter to the Nepalese government demanding release of some 62 newsmen who are in police custody for covering activities of Maoists groups.

The concluding day of the two-day Saef conference, which was titled “Indigenous language print media in South Asia: bridges and barriers”, saw the group passing resolutions about setting up of a Saef website, celebration of the South Asia Day on Dec 7, institution of a Peace Journalism Award, support to the Afghan media, compilation of a glossary of hate terms and demand for the removal of visa restrictions on journalists travelling in South Asia.

The group, however, unanimously dropped the proposal of sending a team, comprising two members each from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, to Gujarat to study the conflict in the region and prepare a report on how to avoid it in future.

A participant of the conference from India said: “It is my assessment that the Indian government is unlikely to issue visas to Pakistani members of the team. For the time being, it can be seen as infeasible.”

The minister for information, Nisar Memon, said that the Pakistan government was committed to the improvement of the environment for peace.

He said PTV had taken a position in response to the rhetorics against Pakistan by Indian TV Doordarshan and “if you get back we will respond positively”.

“The proposals put forward by the participants for creating better environment and their firm resolve to work for it were very encouraging,” Mr Memon said. The minister announced that the government would help the participants to take a trip to Moen-jo-daro.

Smita Deshmukh of the Times of India group, Mumbai, said that cultural invasion, which was often used by politicians as a weapon against each other, was best for both the countries which would like more interaction among people would helped overcoming historical prejudices.

Quatrina Hosain, editor, SAMW-Online, Karachi, said as neighbours India and Pakistan should celebrate the diversity of culture. A. Sivanesaselvan, editor-in-chief of Tamil language “Thinakkural Daily”, Colombo, highlighted the need for creating a style book in each language for promoting peace in the region.

Gulab Kothari, editor, Rajasthan Patrika, Jaipur, said: “We have to put some emotions in our communication to leave impact on people as you can not reach the heart of people without emotional involvement”.

Jonathan Manthrope, freelance journalist from Canada, pointed out that translation of other languages did not carry the real ethos and phrases of its background.

Enayetullah Khan, editor-in-chief, weekly Holiday, Dhaka, said that the essential issue in the region was of social development, adding that poverty bred prejudices.

Kumar Ketkar, editor-in-chief of the Lokmat Group of Newspapers, Mumbai, said that the new generation of journalists was cut off from the grass roots and failed to comprehend the feelings of peasants, workers and the lower middle class.

Sukirat Singh Anand, resident editor, Nawan Zamana, New Delhi, said there was need for knowing more about each other’s culture which would help remove misconception and prejudices.

S.M. Inam, representative of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry, in his paper said that in South Asia, India and Pakistan were two major and most significant countries of the region. “Unfortunately the relation between these two countries has hardly witnessed a perceptible cooling off of heated emotions fanned by highly vocal press on both sides of the border. The short lulls of relative calm have been intermittently interspersed with such agreements as Liaquat Nehru Pact, Tashkent Agreement, Simla Agreement and Lahore Declarartion.”

He pointed out that the attitude of the press, specially of the vernacular press, on both sides had been detrimental.

Hassan Shahriar, executive editor of Daily Ittefaq, Dhaka, said that Bangladesh was flooded with Indian goods but why Bangladesh goods were not available in India despite a visit by Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari.

Saef formed a subcommittee to explore the possibility of instituting the Peace Journalism Award. The following members were selected: Fariha Razzak Haroon, director, Jang Group; Vijay Darda, chairman, Lokmat Group of Publications, Nagpur; Enayetullah Khan, editor-in-chief, weekly Holiday, Dhaka; and Javed Jabbar, founding chairman, South Asia Media Association.

The following members were selected to compile the glossary of hate terms: Mossarat Qadeem, department of political science, University of Peshawar; Sukirat Singh Anand, resident editor, Nawan Zamana, New Delhi and Dr Tariq Rehman, scholar in linguistics, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad. Regarding the celebration of the South Asia Day on Dec 7, Javed Jabbar observed that Saef wanted to initiate substantive action on the day so that the attention of South Asia could be focussed on South Asia. “This could be done in two ways. Saef can either bring together impoverished youths on this day or it can take out supplements to highlight the significance of the.” He added that while 98 per cent of people did not read supplements, they got noticed.

Quatrina Hosain, introduced the participants of the conference to the Saef website. The following members were selected for the website subcommittee: Kumar Ketkar, editor-in-chief, Lokmat Group of Newspapers, Mumbai; Asif Noorani, editor, Star Weekend; Enayetullah Khan, editor-in-chief, weekly Holiday, Dhaka; Ahmed Zahir, managing editor, Haveeru Daily, Male; Frances Bulathsinhala, feature writer, Daily News, Colombo and Babita Basnet, editor, Ghatana Ra Bichar weekly, Kathmandu.

Saef decided that the next meeting of the group would be held in the first week of November in Mumbai, India.