Source: Hueiyen News Service / Manipur Information Centre
New Delhi, December 06 2009:
The 28th Triennial Plenary Session of the Indian Federation of Working Journalists (IFWJ) will be held at Rajgir in Bihar in February 2010.The IFWJ Working Committee, at its 115th meeting held at Dharmashala Town in Himachal Pradesh on 26-30 November, 2009 accepted the invitation of the All-Bihar Union of Journalists to hold its 28th Triennial Plenary Session at Rajgir in Bihar .
Last time the plenary session was held in Bihar ( Patna ) 36 years ago in 1973 .
In a communication received from President of IFWJ K.Vikram Rao today, it is stated that the IFWJ asked its State units to send its list of elected members of the National Council, with their full names and home addresses to IFWJ headquarters in New Delhi .
The plenary session will elect four vice-presidents, six secretaries, a treasurer and 13 members of Working Committee including one to be nominated as Secretary-General by the President.
In the Dharamshala Session, the IFWJ established a Himalayan journalists unit, as part of the IFWJ, to discuss and settle problems of working journalists, living in the States, bordering Tibet and Nepal and the Terai region.
Chandra Mohan Kashmiri, president of the Himachal Pradesh Working Journalists Union, was elected its chairman.
Jigme N.Kazi, editor of the Sikkim Observer (Gangtok) and president of the Sikkim Working Journalists Union, was chosen as Convener.
Among its committee members are Khalid Jehangir (Srinagar,Kashmir), Rakesh Chandola (Dehradun, Uttarakhand), Ms.Mamang Dai (Itanagar,Arunachal), Sanjeev Shekhar (Bihar), Haseeb Siddiqui (U.P.), Keshab Kolita (Assam), Himanshu Chatterjee (Darjeeling, West Bengal), and Debashish Majumder (Tripura), while representatives from Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Manipur will be co-opted.
This newly formed Himalayan journalist unit will hold its first session during the IFWJ plenum in Rajgir (Bihar).
The Dharmashala session was attended by 146 representatives from 26 States and Union Territories.
After a long gap the office-bearers of Bihar, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Sikkim attended the IFWJ meeting.
An IFWJ delegation is planning to go to the Gandhian sites in South Africa and also travel to Egypt and Israel .
Himachal Pradesh Working Journalists Union chief Chandra Mohan Kashmiri, who went to Israel often, and the president of the Bhojpuri Samaj in Durban and Cape Town have promised to help.
Dates will be announced at the plenary session.
The invitation for South Africa was received during the 28- member IFWJ delegation's 10-day visit to Mauritius last September-October.