HIGH COURT OF KARNATAKA Vs. CHINNEN DAS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a contempt proceeding that has been instituted suo moru against four respondents. The respondents - 1, 2 and 3 are the publisher, Printer and Reporter respectively of the Economic Times, Bangalore Edition, dated 7-11-1996 and the 4th respondent is Captain T.S. Gopalakrishna, the former Treasurer of the Bangalore Stock Exchange. Briefly stated, the charges against the four respondents are that in the issue of the Economic Times dated 7-11-1996, a prominent news report was published under the head "Ex-BgSE official to move High Court against Judge's alleged criminal contempt". The news report referred to a judgment delivered by a sitting Judge of this Court Justice M.P. Chinnappa in certain criminal proceedings on 15-4-1996. The 4th respondent is supposed to have applied to the Advocate General of the State of Karnataka for sanction to prosecute Justice M.P. Chinnappa for criminal contempt on certain grounds inter alia that "the Hon'ble Justice made false statements in the judgment contrary to the documentary evidence on record tends to scandalise the Court............"The news report seeks to indicate briefly as to what had transpired in that litigation and highlights the fact that the 4th respondent sought the leave from the Advocate General to institute proceedings against Justice Chinnappa.

(2.) Pursuant to suo motu action for contempt instituted against the respondents respondents-1 to 3 have appeared before us. Respondent-4 has so far not been served and we are therefore confining this order to respondents 1 to 3. These three respondents are represented by the Learned Counsel Mr. Udaya Holla and they have tendered to the Court a statement containing an unconditional apology and they have also putfoeward a short explanation. As far as the Printer and Publisher of the paper are concerned, they have submitted that the material to be included in the issues of the news paper is an exclusively editorial function and that they have neither any control nor any hand in the type of the material that is included from time to time. They have further submitted that as far as the charge of contempt is concerned, that this Court should consider the aspect as to whether they had performed any overt acts or functions of any type in relation to the publication of the offensive material. Their contention is that if it can be demonstrated that they had virtually nothing to do with regard to the choice of material that comes to be printed, which is the exclusive function of the editorial Section of the news paper, that they should be exonerated from any liability in this proceeding. While we do concede that there is considerable substance in the plea that has been put-forward on behalf of these two respondents we need to however record that the law fastens deemed liability on all those persons who are involved in the process of dissemination of news and that therefore, it may not be perfectly justifiable in law to plead immunity in respect of such situations.

(3.) As far as the Reporter is concerned he has very clearly stated that a copy of the application that was made to the Learned Advocate General was forwarded to the news paper by the 4th respondent and that since this was a document in relation to a Court proceeding that parts of the same were reproduced. It is pointed out that the Editor was out of station on that day and that therefore there was nobody in the Office to oversee or re-check the news report which ultimately came to be published. We must in fairness note that the Reporter has very frankly admitted that it was an error on his part to have mechanically reproduced the offensive material because as far as serious situations of this type are concerned, it is necessary on the part of the person who prepares the news report to use basic discretion and propriety while preparing the report and to automatically exclude such material which isprima facie offensive, defamatory or contemptuous. The Reporter has stated that this happened erroneously and he has tendered an unconditional apology to the Court and his Learned Counsel has also pointed out that the publication, which incl udes all those who man the edi torial and other Sections, will be more careful in future to ensure that such an incident never recurs.