Srinagar, Feb 13: The High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh held that no fetters can be placed on the freedom of press by registering an FIR against journalists, who perform their professional duty by publishing news items on the basis of information obtained by them from an identifiable source.
However, the court said, they are also expected to report the coverage with responsibility without any “jingoism” and “divisive” publication or telecast.
Quashing an FIR against a journalist Asif Iqbal Naik, who is reporting for Early Times newspaper, Justice M.A Chowdhary observed that the mode and manner in which the FIR has been lodged clearly reflects no offence is disclosed against the petitioner and the respondents could have given their version by similar mode but they chose unique method of “silencing” the petitioner.
“Needless to say that press is often referred to as the fourth pillar of democracy and freedom of the press is vital for the functioning of any democratic country like India,” Justice Chowdary held.
In April 2018 an FIR was registered against Naik under Sections 504, 505, 506 & 336 of RPC on the directions of District Development Commissioner Kishtwar.
It was alleged in the FIR that Naik had uploaded a post on his facebook account against a complainant, who had talked to National TV channel, India Today over Kathua rape and murder case.
The complainant alleged that besides attack on his privacy and security, the petitioner in his comments responded to the comments of two persons and termed that the complainant is doing this all for “cheap publicity.”
“Due to this propaganda, the public can lynch him over such a sensitive issue and since he has a large family at his native town, his family members especially youth and friends are bereaving in anger and contacted him on phone and there is every apprehension of breach of peace due to attack on his reputation, privacy and security in the open public domain on the internet due to false propaganda by the petitioner on social media,” he stated.
On the other hand, the petitioner through counsel F.S Butt contended that the allegations leveled against the petitioner are totally baseless, malicious and do not disclose any offence.
He submitted that even if the allegations are taken on their face value and accepted in their entirety, do not prima facie constitute any offence or make out a case against the petitioner and despite such facts petitioner is being harassed by respondents just to jeopardize his profession.
The counsel contended that petitioner has constantly highlighted the issues of public importance and has reported the administrative lapses and police brutalities from time to time due to which he is not in the good books of the administration and police officials.
He further contended that they (officials) are looking for an opportunity to settle the score so that the petitioner could be prevented from reporting anything incriminating against the administration and police officials of the District.
Allowing a plea, the court said that the petition succeeds on three counts, firstly that the complainant by filing counter to this petition and who was also present in the court at the time of hearing, has denied to have lodged any complaint so as to base the impugned FIR,
Secondly, the court said that SHO in his status report has also stated that the complainant had not associated with the investigation despite several requests.
Thirdly, the bench held, the District Magistrate as an Executive Magistrate was not competent to issue directions for investigations of the case.
Earlier, Kishtwar police had registered an FIR against Naik for publishing a report on custodial torture by the police with a headline, “Father of 5 brutally tortured by Kishtwar Police.”
However, in 2021 the court had quashed FIR against Naik while holding that mere fact that FIR was lodged only against the journalist and not against the person, who has disclosed the said incident to the journalist prima facie, establishes “malice” on the part of the respondents.
