New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday, October 31, quashed a defamation case against Aroon Purie, founder-director of India Today, noting that the editor-in-chief of a publication cannot be prosecuted for defamation unless “specific allegations” are made against them.
According to a LiveLaw report, a bench of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) U.U. Lalit and Justice Bela M. Trivedi made the observations while dealing with a case related to an article published in the magazine in April 2007 titled ‘Mission Misconduct’. The article detailed how three Indian officials in the Indian High Commission to the UK had to be recalled in March 2007 after facing a number of serious allegations in what the news outlet called a “string of embarrassments”.
These allegations, according to the article, included “sexual misconduct, corruption in issuance of visas and sale of Indian passports to illegal immigrants”.
The article goes on to make specific reference to an officer of the 1989 batch of the Indian Foreign Service who faced accusations of soliciting sexual favours from a local, Edinburgh-based employee on the same mission as him. What’s more, the articles noted that a subsequent probe revealed financial irregularities as well and that after being sent back home, the accused diplomat faced disciplinary action.
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After the publication of the article, a complaint was filed against a number of people, including Purie, which alleged that the article was defamatory and sought action under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
While Purie’s counsel noted that under Section 7 of the Press and Registration of Books Act, 1867, only a ‘printer/editor’ could be prosecuted, the top court held that this depends on the facts of the case.
Section 7 of the aforementioned Act deals with an office copy of a particular declaration being considered prima facie evidence.
In the present case, LiveLaw quoted the top court as saying:
“Though the benefit of presumption under Section 7 of the 1867 Act is not applicable so far as Chief Editors or Editors-in-Chief are concerned, the matter would be required to be considered purely from the perspective of the allegations made in the complaint. If the allegations are sufficient and specific, no benefit can be extended to such Chief Editor or Editor-in-Chief. Conversely, it would logically follow that if there are no specific and sufficient allegations, the matter would stand reinforced by reason of the fact that no presumption can be invoked against such Chief Editor or Editor-in-Chief.”
In this regard, the bench did not find any allegations specifically attributed to erstwhile editor-in-chief Purie and thus held that he could not be held liable for what the author of the article had written.
However, the court did not grant any relief to the article’s author, observing that he “stands on a different footing”.
“Whether what he did was an act which was justified or not would be a question of fact to be gone into only at the stage of trial,” the bench said, according to LiveLaw.