Pakistan’s Ministry of Interior has cancelled the NoC of ARY News, the television network said on Friday.

The coalition government led by Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) has taken one more step towards the economic murder of the journalist fraternity by cancelling the NoC of ARY News, the channel reported.

The cancellation of NoC will mean economic murder of more than 4,000 media professionals associated with the news channel, ARY News said.

The move came after the airing of a controversial statement delivered by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader and Imran Khan’s Chief of Staff Shahbaz Gill on ARY News.

The channel had also issued a clarification that Gill’s statement was his personal opinion and had nothing to do with the channel’s policy.

The channel’s administration condemned the suspension of its transmissions, saying the network is being victimised by the federal government.

On August 10, the Sindh High Court (SHC) had ordered the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) to immediately restore the channel’s transmission across Pakistan.

The channel had gone off air in many parts of the country on Monday evening without any prior notice by the authorities.

The SHC bench heard the plea related to the suspension of ARY News and issued directives to the cable operators for the immediate restoration of the TV channel’s transmission, ARY News reported.

In a 10-page order, the court had also suspended the show-cause notice issued to ARY News by Pemra. The SHC also stopped the media regulatory authority from suspending the licence of the TV channel till the next hearing.

The court had also issued notice to Pemra and the deputy attorney general and adjourned the hearing until August 17.

(The story has been published via a syndicated feed.)