The Bombay High Court on Friday, while hearing a defamation case filed by actress Shilpa Shetty Kundra against media outlets, said that passing a blanket gag order on the media against reporting anything against her shall impact the freedom of press, adding that there is a judicial limit on what can be construed as good or bad journalism. However, some media outlets were asked to take down a few videos and contents that were found to be defamatory by the actress.
Shilpa Shetty, wife of Raj Kundra arrested in the pornography case, on Thursday filed a defamation case against 29 media outlets.
The Bombay HC, however, directed the three videos uploaded on YouTube channels of three private persons be deleted and not uploaded again as they were malicious in nature. The court noted that the freedom of press has to be balanced with the right to privacy of an individual.
The actress, in an interim application, had sought for the media to be restrained from allegedly publishing any incorrect, false, malicious and defamatory content.
The court noted that the articles referred to by Shilpa Shetty in her suit do not seem to be defamatory. “It cannot be like if you (media) are not going to write or say anything nice about me (Shilpa Shetty) then do not say anything at all. How can this be,” it asked.
vThe court noted that most of the articles referred to in the suit, including one that claimed that “Shetty cried and fought with her husband Kundra” when he was brought to their house by the police for joint interrogation, was based on what police sources said.
Shetty had objected to news articles about the actress breaking down and confronting Raj Kundra when Mumbai Police raided their residence. Saraf said, “It was something that had happened between a husband and wife and it was private and should not have been reported.” To this, the court said that the act of Shetty happened in front of outsiders (policemen) and it was reported from “crime branch sources. Also, the act of crying was not defamatory but it shows that she’s a human”.
The HC also said that the media just can’t sing praises and that Shetty is a public figure and that such articles are not defamatory. “You (Shetty) chose a life in public life. Your life is under a microscope. It cannot be that if the media is not going to say anything nice about her (Shetty) then they will be asked to say nothing at all.”
