E-Paper
Court grants bail to 2 journos held for defamatory content
Hyderabad court grants bail to two NTV journalists arrested for airing allegedly defamatory news about an IAS officer; investigation ongoing.
A local court in Hyderabad on Thursday granted bail to two television journalists belonging to Telugu channel NTV in connection with the telecast of alleged defamatory news against a woman IAS officer early this week, people familiar with the matter said.
The 14th additional chief metropolitan magistrate in Nampally criminal courts granted bail to the two journalists – the channel’s input editor Donthu Ramesh and reporter Dasari Sudheer, who were arrested on Wednesday, based on a complaint filed by special chief secretary to the Telangana government Jayesh Ranjan.
After questioning them for several hours, the arrested journalists were produced before the magistrate late on Wednesday night.
Their lawyers had argued before the magistrate that the case did not stand legal scrutiny in the absence of a complaint from the woman who was the victim.
After hearing the arguments, the magistrate in the early hours of Thursday ordered release of the journalists on bail after confiscating their passports and on condition that they will not leave the city till the completion of investigation. The journalists were asked to furnish personal bonds for ₹20,000 each.
The state government constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT) under Hyderabad police commissioner V C Sajjanar to probe into the alleged conspiracy. Sajjanar told reporters that a case was registered and investigation underway in the case. He said that the chief executive officer (CEO) of the TV channel was supposed to appear for questioning in response to notice served on the channel’s management.
