MediaOne case: 11 MPs, others question ‘sealed cover jurisprudence’

In a statement issued on Monday, the signatories – which included several leading lawyers and activists – said the Centre “must not be allowed to abuse its powers to curb critical voices… that dare to question the official narrative.”

By: Express News Service

New Delhi | Updated: February 15, 2022 02:54 AM IST

3 min read

The appeal would come before the division bench of Chief Justice S Manikumar and Justice Shaji P Chaly on Thursday for admission.

A DOZEN MPs from different opposition parties, along with 30 eminent personalities, issued a statement on Monday, expressing disappointment over Kerala High Court’s verdict last week to uphold the Information and Broadcasting Ministry’s order that revoked the broadcasting licence of Malayalam news channel Media One after the Ministry of Home Affairs denied it security clearance.

“Extremely disappointed by the decisions of the single-judge bench of the Kerala High Court, which refused to overturn the cancellation of Media One News’s licence by the MIB & MHA and protect the Fundamental Right to Freedom of Speech and Expression,” the statement said.

Opinion | By upholding ban on Media One, on basis of material in sealed envelope, Kerala HC has gone against Supreme Court verdicts

It said the court’s decision “was based on a ‘sealed cover’ envelope provided by the MHA, the contents of which were not shared” with Media One.

The signatories of the statement included Congress’s Digivijaya Singh; TMC’s Mahua Moita; DMK’s Kanimozhi; RJD’s Manoj Kumar Jha; Shiv Sena’s Priyanka Chaturvedi; CPI’s Elamaram Kareem and Binoy Viswam; IUML’s E T Mohd Basheer; RSP’s N K Premachandran; AIUDF’s Badruddin Ajmal; LJD’s M V Shreyams Kumar; and CPI(M)’s John Brittas.

The statement was also signed by Supreme Court lawyers Prashant Bhushan and Colin Gonsalves, former Bombay High Court judge Kolse Patil B G, journalists, writers and social activists among others.

After the single-judge bench’s order last week, Media One approached the division bench of the Kerala High Court.

According to the statement, the order “goes against the basic principles of natural justice, which mandate that the material evidence in any adjudication process, and especially in a matter concerning Fundamental Rights, must be shared with both parties to the dispute”.

Story continues below this ad

“Freedom of the press is essential to the health of any democracy, and the central government must not be allowed to abuse its powers to curb critical voices and television news channels that dare to question the official narrative,” it said.

At a press conference in Delhi, Bhushan said the “growing spectre of what is called sealed cover jurisprudence” is a “gross violation of the principles of natural justice”, which is “unknown in the civilised world. It needs to be completely uprooted from the legal systems of this country”.

Veteran journalist N Ram, who is also a signatory to the release, too raised concerns about the “sealed cover jurisprudence” during the press conference. He said blocking a licence is not just about the freedom to broadcast. “It involves interconnected rights”, including media freedom, freedom of speech and expression, freedom to disseminate and consume information”, all of which fall within the “framework of speech and expression”.

From the homepage