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A Petitioner has approached the Hon’ble M.P. High Court under Article 226/227 of the Constitution of India for issuance of a Writ, Order or Directions in the nature of mandamus (PIL) to the Respondent No.1 (U.O.I through Ministry of Information and Broadcasting) to restrain the Media/Respondent No.4 (Republic Media Network Through its Edition-in-Chief Arnav Goswami) to stop the continuous defaming the congress top Leadership Mrs. Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.

The petitioner is the General Secretary of the M.P. Mahila Congress Committee, she states due to the bias continuous telecast of Respondent No.4, the fundamental rights of the Petitioner U/A 19 (2) of the Constitution of India is violated.

“Therefore Petitioner approached this Hon’ble Court for appropriate direction against the Respondent No.1 to implementation of the Direction of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of “Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India and Others Versus Cricket Association of Bengal and Others 1995 (2) SCC 161” and restrain the respondent no.4 for further telecast any bias reporting towards the Congress party and their top leaders.”

“Democracy postulates that there should be periodical elections so that people may be in a position either to re-elect the same representatives or choose new representatives. Democracy also contemplates that elections should be free and fair and the voters should be in a position to vote for the candidates of their choice. The Respondent No.4 telecasting the negative reporting with bias ill mind, which is harmful for the democratic structure.”- Excerpt from petition.

The petition states the judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme in Union of India v. Assn. for Democratic Reforms which observe that, “One sided information, disinformation, misinformation and non- information, all equally create an uninformed citizenry which makes democracy a farce.”

It is further stated in the petition that the Anchor of R Bharat broadcasting news channel by falsely claiming himself as a Journalist use defamatory language and do continuous attack on the dignity in live debates i.e (Puchata Hai Bharat – India is Questioning) without collecting public opinion form citizens of country. There are numbers of criminal proceeding are pending against said Anchor and his broadcasting channel.

“the respondent No.4 continuously 24 x 7 criticizing the Congress Party and their top leader for that petitioner also wrote a complaint on dated 23.04.2020 but no action has been taken.”
- noted the petition.

“The Indian Telegraph Act, 1885 is totally inadequate to govern an important medium like the radio and television, i.e., broadcasting media. The Act was intended for an altogether different purpose when it was enacted. This is the result of the law in this country not keeping pace with the technological advances in the field of information and communications.”- excerpt from petition.

The petitioner contends that the respondent Media house and the Anchor are running the hidden agenda by telecasting such defamatory negative reporting through a day 24X7 and due to this type of the malaise media practice, one of the congress leader Spokesperson also died during the live debate session.

“Therefore in this regard the details guidelines required to be framed by this Hon’ble Court to restrict the assassination of dignity of individual, community, religious saint, religious & political organization by these broadcasting electronic channels in the name of freedom of ‘Press’ .”- stated the petition and an interim order was prayed to be issued in this regard to the Respondent channel.

The petitioner prayed for the following reliefs:

“i) to issue an appropriate Writ, Order or Direction in the nature of Mandamus to the Central Government / Respondent No. 1 for implementation of the Direction passed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of “Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India and Others Versus Cricket Association of Bengal and Others 1995 (2) SCC 161” and ;

ii) to issue an appropriate Writ, Order or Direction in the nature of Mandamus to the Central Government / Respondent No. 1 to restrict the assassination of dignity of individual, community, religious saint, & political organization by these broadcasting electronic channels in the name of freedom of ‘Press’ and /or ;

 iii) to issue an appropriate Writ, Order or Direction in the nature of Mandamus to the Respondent No.1 to retrain the Respondent No.4 (Republic Bharat News Channel) for misuse of airwaves by P a g e 28 broadcasting electronic channels in the name of media, press and journalism and ;

iv) to pass such other Writ (s), order (s) or direction(s) as is deemed fit and proper in the premises of the case, which is not specifically prayed for hereinabove.”