Asaram Trust plea in SC against ‘biased’ reports

Highlighting the role played by the media in the Aarushi murder case, the Sant Shree Asaram Ji Ashram Trust...

Highlighting the role played by the media in the Aarushi murder case, the Sant Shree Asaram Ji Ashram Trust approached the Supreme Court on Monday seeking guidelines to stop the electronic media from carrying out “biased and damaging reports”.

The Trust and another petitioner, R P Arora, pleaded before the Bench of Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan for a mechanism to end such reports. Perturbed with the way news channels covered deaths of children at schools run by the ashram in Ahmedabad and Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh, the Trust contended that the media has launched a vilification campaign. Senior advocate Mukul Rohtagi claimed news reports were being aired without taking into account the version of the petitioners.

The Bench, also consisting of Justice P Sathasivam, was reluctant to pass any direction saying “you cannot seek a general guideline”. It later issued a notice to the Union Government on the limited issue of seeking an effective implementation of the Cable Television Network Regulation Act, 1995 and rules relating to it. Arguing his case, Rohtagi agreed that there was the issue of Freedom of Speech, but that cannot be “unbridled so as to prejudice the rights of the other person”. He said a code for regulating the electronic media was in place, but was rarely implemented. The Bench said: “We will try to find some mechanism” andsought the Centre’s response as to who was the responsible authority for implementation of guidelines related to regulation of electronic media.