SSR case media trial: Have NBA to keep eye on electronic media, Centre tells Bombay HC
The Union government through the ministry of information and broadcasting assured the Bombay high court (HC) that there was a mechanism in place in the form of News Broadcasters Association (NBA) which regulates the electronic media. The statement was made in response to the issues raised in various public interest litigations (PILs) filed against the media trial in Sushant Singh Rajput death case. The ministry also submitted that it was in the process of formulating a better mechanism to address the grievances.
NBA, on its part, informed the court that it had taken action against many channels and had also banned channels for infringing the programme code. However, when asked if any action was taken against channels for running media trials, NBA replied in the negative. The court has posted further hearing on Monday.
A division bench of chief justice Dipankar Datta and justice Girish Kulkarni, while hearing a bunch of PILs filed by various individuals and NGOs including former senior police officials, was informed by additional solicitor general Anil Singh that various Supreme Court and HC judgements have stressed on the need for self-regulation by the media. Referring to a judgement of the Kerala HC, Singh said the courts have time and again refrained from framing guidelines for restricting the media on the grounds that it was in the domain of the parliament and the state legislature. Singh also referred to other judgements wherein courts have refused to frame guidelines and said that media should act responsibly.
Singh further submitted that NBA was founded to act as a self-regulating authority for the electronic media as well as serve as a redressal mechanism for complaints. Singh added that NBA exercised control on members, and if the channels did not heed, the complaint was forwarded to the ministry. In such cases, he said, an inter-ministerial committee took action against channels, including ones that are not members of NBA.
In light of these submissions, Singh said there was no need for additional mechanism, and added that in light of the grievances raised in the PILs, it was considering ways to regulate non-members and to bring effective mechanisms against them.
When the court questioned whether wither the ministry or NBA had dealt with complaints pertaining to media trials, Singh replied in the negative and said action had been initiated against errant channels pertaining to advertisement or objectionable content.
The court then observed that in the current scenario the electronic media, while exercising its right to freedom of speech, was violating the rights of others by tarnishing the image of the subjects. “Legitimate restraint is a must, else there will be absolute mayhem,” observed the bench.
The court reiterated that it only wanted to stress on the fact that there was no mechanism to control electronic media like there was for the print media. Singh responded, “We expected media to show restraint, but they did not; so we are taking measures to come up with some mechanism.”
While making submissions on behalf of NBA, senior counsel Arvind Datar informed the court that the self-regulating body was taking cognisance of complaints as well as was initiating suo motu action against errant members. He also submitted data showing that the NBA was taking action on 30 instances of member channels infringing programme code every year.
After hearing the submissions, the court said that it would hear the channels on Monday and directed them not to repeat arguments and posted hearing for Monday.