Islamabad, Mar 14 (IANS): The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory (PEMRA) has issued a show-cause notice to Geo News for discussing "under investigation/trial matters" and also for airing "unipolarity of views in its news bulletins and programmes".

The notice issued on Friday called on Geo News' CEO or any authorised representative of the channel to appear for a personal hearing regarding the matter on March 20, reports The News International.

The development comes a day after the National Accountability Burea (NAB) arrested Editor-in-Chief of the Jang Geo Media Group, Mir Shakil-ur-Rahman for illegal possession of a piece of land.

Despite giving the channel a week to respond to its notice, PEMRA has already started issuing directives to cable operators to shut down GEO News' broadcast in several cities across Pakistan and push the channel back to the last numbers.

"This is being done at a time when the Editor-in-Chief of the Jang Group/Geo has been arrested by NAB," The News International quoted Geo News Director News Rana Jawad as saying.

"This (censorship) is a manifestation of the conspiracy to shut down, silence and end media," he added.

Jawad further said said that Shakil-ur-Rahman's arrest and the subsequent censorship of Geo shows that the two events were linked to each other so that the largest media group in the country could be silenced and its voice should not reach the masses.