The SNP has announced it will shut out media from its leadership hustings to allow a "safe space for members to ask questions".
But leadership candidate Kate Forbes has called for the meetings to be streamed live online.
Party bosses confirmed the nine sessions taking place next month will only allow in members and won't be live streamed.
In contrast, the Tory party leadership hustings last year allowed in both TV cameras and reporters.
A spokesman for the SNP National Executive Committee said: "SNP members are the lifeblood of our party and our movement.
"It is the members who will be voting for the next leader of the party, so the SNP NEC has designed the party hustings as a safe space for members to ask questions of the three candidates.”
They added that pool broadcast cameras and photographers will be able to get an "establishment shot of the leadership contestants inside the hustings halls prior to the debate starting".
Reporters will only be allowed to "gather reaction from outside the hustings hall".
Forbes called for the hustings to be livestreamed after being contacted members from across Scotland had got who were unable to attend their closest hustings due to spaces being snapped up.
She said the candidates don't "have anything to hide" and said that streaming the hustings would be good for the contest.
She said: “As you would expect for Scotland’s biggest political party, there is considerable interest from members in listening to the forthcoming hustings.
“As the leader of the SNP will also become First Minister, it is no surprise that the general public as well as the media are keen to follow the debate too.
“I have received messages from party members the length and breadth of Scotland because all of the spaces for the hustings have been snapped up.
“I fully believe in democracy and transparency, and I think it would be a positive thing for the hustings to be livestreamed to a significantly bigger audience – the SNP has a membership of 100,000 and most of the venues will only take a few hundred people.
“I don’t believe any of the candidates have anything to hide, in fact, it would give us a platform to set a positive example for how to have respectful, informed and varied debate.
“I hope that members of the media can be given access too – as well as the national media, I know a number of local media outlets will be very keen to cover town hall meetings that are happening on their doorstep.”
The nine sessions are taking place in various locations across the country.
One will be exclusively online while the others will all be in front of a live audience.
The SNP leadership race has become increasingly heated in recent days.
Humza Yousaf said today that SNP leadership rival Kate Forbes should not "trash" the record of the Government she serves in.
Forbes appeared to aim a dig at the Government by saying Scotland needs “competent leaders” who are able to “execute and deliver” on plans.
And a senior SNP MP also accused leadership hopeful Ash Regan of "trying to look like an opposition politician".
Glasgow South MP Stewart McDonald hit out at Regan on Twitter on Tuesday morning after she apologised on behalf of the party for its U-turn on dualling the A9 and A96.
Scottish Conservative MSP Craig Hoy said: "The SNP are desperate for their internal civil war to be conducted in private, rather than airing their dirty linen in public, which explains this cowardly and paranoid media blackout.
"This is nothing short of a disgrace when a new SNP leader – and ultimately First Minister – will be in place in just a few weeks’ time.
"The party have adopted a ‘nothing to see here’ attitude, when the public ultimately want to see the three candidates to replace Nicola Sturgeon properly scrutinised on their plans for Scotland.
"The SNP are famed for their lack of transparency but this really takes the biscuit. They have laughably said by excluding the media that these events will be a safe space for members. What do they think the media are going to do to them?
"This is a misguided decision that the SNP should rethink urgently."
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