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Synopsis

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday ordered Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) weekly ‘Organiser’ and another website ‘The Commune’ to take down an article alleging that the principal of a Christian school was sexually exploiting nuns and Hindu women.

The article was titled as ‘Indian Catholic Church Sex Scandal: Priest exploiting nuns and Hindu women exposed’. The article further claimed that the principal of the Christian school was also engaged in sexual activities with staff members, chefs, and students and had also been accused of financial wrongdoings.

The bench of Justice Jyoti Singh ordered, “An ex parte ad-interim injunction is passed against the Defendants, directing the Defendants, their partners, directors, servants, agents and/or any other person acting on their behalf to remove the offending article available at the website of Defendant No. 1 (The Organizer) and from the website of Defendant No. 2 (The Commune)”.

The court said that the reports were published in a “reckless manner without any factual verification” and were tarnishing the image and reputation of the plaintiff, who was a respectable citizen of the country and associated with several educational institutions. “It needs no gainsaying that it takes years to build a reputation and therefore, right to reputation has been recognized as a fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution”, it added.

“The right to freedom of speech and expression cannot be taken as an unfettered right so as to defame and tarnish the reputation of another person. It has been repeatedly held by Courts that fundamental right to freedom of speech has to be counterbalanced with the right of reputation of an individual”, the court held.

The court observed that the Christian school principal had made out a prima facie case that the impugned article was “damaging and tarnishing his image” in society and as long as the article continued to remain in the public domain, it was likely to continue causing damage to his reputation.

“No doubt, Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution provides the right of freedom of speech and expression to all persons, however, it cannot be overlooked that the same is subject to restrictions under Article 19(2) which includes defamation”, the court observed.

“The names of the Institutions with which the Plaintiff is concerned are being deliberately omitted in the present order for the sake of anonymity and reputation of the said Institutions”, the court stated.

Case Title: XYZ v. Bharat Prakashan (Delhi) Ltd. And Ors.