NISHI PREM Vs. JAVED AKHTAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal preferred by original defendant No. 3 against the order dated July 14, 1987 reported in AIR 1987 Bom 339 passed by the learned Chamber Judge directing defendant No. 3 to disclose on affidavit the names of person to whom the reference is made under the article written by defendant No. 3 and published in the issue of April, 1987 of magazine "Star Dust". The facts relevant for the purpose of understanding the controversy in this appeal are as follows :

(2.) The defendant No. 3 has written an article under the title "Queer Quartet" and the article is published in April, 1987 in the magazine and the article relates to the plaintiff and his wife who is a film artist. The plaintiff claims that the article is per se defamatory and the statements and suggestions made in the article are false to the knowledge of defendant No. 3. The article is published in a film magazine which is published in three languages : (1) English, (2) Hindi, and (3) Gujarathi and defendant No. 2 is the editor of the magazine. We refrain from setting out the contents of the article save and except observing that the author claims that she had over-heard certain conversation at a gathering and thereafter made enquiries with various people in the film industry as well as the members of the Unit of a Film "Mr. India". The article quotes what was told to the author by these people. The plaintiff claims that the author of the article had concocted fictitious facts out of her fertile imagination and reference to fictitious persons in the industry and the Unit was made only to lend credibility to the article. The plaintiff also claims that the defendants made no efforts to ascertain the truth of the contents of the article from the plaintiff. The article sets out that one of the persons who furnished the information was defendant No. 5. The plaintiff instituted suit on March 30, 1987 for a decree for damages amounting to Rs. 25,00,000/- with incidental reliefs.

(3.) The plaintiff took out Chamber Summons No. 370 of 1987 for a direction to the author of the article to disclose on affidavit the names of 'Starwife', 'Industrywalla' Industrywallis', and 'Unitwalla' of film Unit of 'Mr. India' referred to in the article. The affidavit filed in support of the Chamber Summons by the plaintiff on April 9, 1987 sets out that the author of the article should be directed to disclose the names to enable the plaintiff to make the proceedings more effective and complete and to substantiate his case. It further recites that the plaintiff is interested in suing the persons who are alleged to have made statements to the author of the article and to add them as party defendants to the suit. In answer to the Chamber Summons, defendant No. 3 filed an affidavit on June 3, 1987 and it is claimed that the statements made in the article are substantially true and correct and the expression of opinion are fair comments on a matter with which the public is concerned. It is further claimed that an application for discovery by interrogatories to obtain the disclosure of the names of the persons who gave information to defendant No. 3 is made with the object of suing them and that object is improper and constitutes abuse of the process of discovery. The defendant No. 3 claims that she should not be compelled to disclose the names of persons who will be probably called as witnesses at the trial of the action. It is further stated that revelation of the names would be unfair and unjust to the persons concerned and would amount to breach of confidence and would be contrary to the professional ethics of the writer. The defendant No. 3 asserts that it is a settled practice that discovery by way of interrogatories should not be ordered against a publication which deals with matters interesting to a large number of the public. The application made by the plaintiff, claims defendant No. 3, is an effort to discover the evidence which the defendants propose to adduce in support of their claim and the disclosure is sought with a view to enable the plaintiff to intimidate the defendants' witnesses by threat of action.