MediaOne Ban: Kerala High Court To Pronounce Judgment Tomorrow

The Kerala High Court on Monday reserved its judgement in the petition filed by Popular Malayalam news channel MediaOne seeking to set aside an order issued by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting revoking its license.

Justice N Nagaresh conveyed that he will pronounce the judgment tomorrow morning in open court after perusing the files. Meanwhile the interim order deferring the Ministry's order for one more day.  

In the last hearing, the Union Government was directed to produce before the Court the relevant files of the Ministry of Home Affairs which recommended the cancellation of the license of the channel citing national security reasons.

Today when the matter was taken up, Senior Advocate S. Sreekumar appeared for the channel and argued that security clearance was never denied to the petitioner but to another channel MediaOne Life. The senior counsel also pointed out the difference between a fresh application for security clearance and an application for renewal, to highlight that in an application renewal, the interference of the Ministry of Home Affairs is not warranted. Reliance was also placed on the Supreme Court decision of Anuradha Bhasin v Union of India to ponder over the argument of chilling effect. 

Senior Advocate Jaju Babu appearing on behalf of KUWJ, an intervenor in the case, further submitted that even after new restrictions were brought into place through amendments, security clearance issued to MediaOne was renewed. He added that the order of the Ministry affects the freedom of the press and that this was concerning. The senior counsel added that the license was revoked without following any due process of law or the statutory mandate and that no reasons were assigned to prove that there was a breach of national security. 

However, ASGI. S. Manu contended that one cannot argue that once it clears the security clearance requirements, the security clearance can never be revoked. He asserted that a security clearance is not perpetual. The ASGI also vehemently objected to the intervening applications filed by certain employees of the company and a registered union, arguing that allowing such interventions would mean that national security is being belittled.