Delhi HC summons defendant in Newslaundry defamation case

The suit stems from a series of tweets posted by Mitra from February to April in which he allegedly made derogatory posts about the digital platform’s women employees, their workplace and subscribers

New Delhi

A bench of justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav passed the direction after the women employees, including company managing editor Manisha Pande, submitted that defendant Mitra has not shown remorse. (Representative photo)

The Delhi high court on Monday issued a summons to Delhi-based defence analyst Abhijit Iyer Mitra in a defamation suit filed by nine women employees of digital news platform Newslaundry for his allegedly sexually abusive social media posts.

The suit stems from a series of tweets posted by Mitra from February to April in which he allegedly made derogatory posts about the digital platform’s women employees, their workplace and subscribers.

A bench of justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav passed the direction after the women employees, including company managing editor Manisha Pande, submitted that Mitra has not shown remorse even after taking down his tweets. They have even sought damages against Mitra. The women employees, represented by advocate Bani Dixit, also urged the court to permanently restrain Mitra from posting against them.

Senior advocate Percival Billimoria, appearing for Mitra, urged the court to dismiss the suit since the cause no longer survived after he had taken down the allegedly defamatory content. On May 21, Mitra gave an undertaking to court to take down the posts within five hours, after the judge slammed him for his language. The court said that the “choice of words” was “impermissible in civilized society”. The senior counsel further argued that the posts were not defamatory.

The bench said, “You have to stick to the point. Today we can’t look at your written statement. Today it’s between the plaintiff and the court. Since the defamatory material has been taken down, what remains is the compensation. We’ll issue summons.”

The order said, “The aforesaid aspects (regarding Mitra’s defence) will be looked into at the time of submissions. The interim order, which the court has passed, will continue.”

While fixing September 10 as the next date of hearing, the court also granted the women employees the liberty to file an application, in case Mitra posted further allegedly defamatory content. “In the meantime any further defamatory statement or content is published by defendant no 1, the plaintiffs will be at liberty to file appropriate application,” the court said.

In the suit, seeking ₹2 crore in damages and an unconditional apology, the women employees alleged that Mitra falsely and maliciously labelled them using derogatory terms and slurs, posted obscene poems undermining their dignity and also launched a scathing attack against the platform’s subscribers.

“Even a bare perusal for the allegations and insinuations, which have been tabulated in the plaint in detail, leave not an iota of doubt that these are capable of causing inordinate corrosion of the reputation and goodwill of the plaintiffs that has been arduously built over a period of years. Furthermore, the libelous and unsubstantiated allegations by the defendant No.1 (Mitra) will not only directly and adversely affect the reputation of the plaintiffs amongst their friends, family and peers, but has caused enormous mental trauma, harassment and embarrassment,” they said in the suit.

The suit went on to add that terms used by Mitra were not only an insult and attack on women journalists, but reinforced deeply regressive and violent attitudes toward sex workers, who face systemic marginalisation and stigma. “No woman/ person deserves to be dehumanised. No profession deserves to be weaponized as an insult. These remarks strip women—whether journalists or sex workers—of agency, identity, and respect,” they said in the suit.

Seeking takedown of the tweets, the suit states that the publications do not fall within the purview of “free speech” “journalistic criticism” “satire” or fair comments and were rather a sexist slur aimed at humiliating the women professionals of Newslaundry.