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 The senior counsel added that the license was revoked without following any due process of law or the statutory mandate and that no reasons were assigned to prove that there was a breach of national security.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. The developments ensued in a writ petition filed by the television channel, owned by Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited, hours after the Ministry suspended its telecast citing security concerns. Accordingly, MediaOne had gone off air on the same day at noon.Reports suggest that the television channel was found backing the Jamaat-e-Islami. The Court had initially stayed the operation of the order till February 2 and subsequently extended the interim relief till today. The Centre had earlier issued permission enabling the petitioner channel to uplink and downlink TV programmes, and this permission was valid till 29.09.2021.Senior Advocate S. Sreekumar appearing for the petitioner had admitted that the channel was issued with a show-cause notice by the Centre on January 5, 2022, on why the Centre should not revoke its license in consideration of national security and public order.However, it was pointed out that in response to this notice, the company had requested not to proceed with the notice without affording an opportunity of hearing and that they were not informed of the reasons why the security clearance was denied.Nevertheless, he argued that the Ministry proceeded to revoke the permission granted to the petitioner with immediate effect, thereby removing the channel from the list of permitted channels.The counsel added that such a notice could only be served by the Ministry of Home Affairs, and not the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.In its plea filed through Advocate Rakesh K, the channel had also contended that it has not involved itself in any sort of anti-national activity.Therefore, it had prayed that considering the huge investment involved in the business, the order of the Ministry be withdrawn.Case Title: Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited v. Union of India

MediaOne Ban: Kerala High Court To Pronounce Judgment Tomorrow

Hannah M Varghese

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