Comment

When the Emergency began in 1975, those who didn’t subscribe to censorship shut down their newspapers and journals. Unfortunately, India didn’t have private TV channels then.

There has been mushrooming growth of private players since the Supreme Court ruled 15 years ago that ‘air waves are public property’ and not the personal fiefdom of government.

Until then, the government had been opposed to opening the electronic media to private channels on the specious claim that this could ‘endanger national sovereignty, spoil relationships with other countries, cause public disorder and violate the undefined decency and morality.’

Opponents rubbish such contentions saying that ourlaws are stringent enough to deal with these grounds which support regulating the freedom to speech.

Surprisingly, there has been a thundering silence on government’s mid-week ban on a non-entertainment, newborn Hindi news TV channel, Live India.

The government boldly announced its decision and justified it saying the channel had telecast a ‘doctored’ sting operation that defied ‘public order, morality and decency’.

It ignored the facts that those who masterminded this ‘sting’ relating to a sex racket in a government school and some other players including the lead artist had been arrested and subjected to judicial proceedings. The Constitution abhors subjecting a citizen to double jeopardy.

In other words, government could also order a ban or suspension of a newspaper or a journal if, in its own wisdom, it found that the published material violated any of the safeguards such as morality, decency or public order.

It wouldn’t matter to the government if the decision has a serious effect on the right to life of workers and many others who are associated with the medium.

Only once, during the Emergency, has the Supreme Court also held that government could deny citizens theright to life. After retirement, the judges who signed this judgment expressed regret.

Right to life has been defined by the apex court as the right to live with dignity, including the right to work, education, health, getting and disseminating information, privacy and movement.

The ban on Live India could be a test blast for the government. Since the enactment of the Cable TV Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995, this was perhaps the first opportunity the government got toimplement section 20 (2) of the act.

We have to ask whether the telecast of the sting caused a threat to public order or the live telecast on all the channels of the mass violence against the Centre’s affidavit on Ram Setu did.

It is easier to levy the charge of disrupting ‘public order’ but it’s rare when the executive can satisfactorily differentiate between public order and law and order.

Public order is not the same thing as public safety and hence no restrictions can be placed on the right to freedom of speech and expression on the ground that public safety is endangered.

Preventive orders are passed on the apprehension of disruption of public order and not law and order. At the most the doctored sex racket sting telecast caused a ‘law and order’ problem in a limited area that the police handled.

The law then took its own course. But the ban on the channel smacks of haste, or if someone might like to say, a test blast to measure public reaction against a disorderly mandate. Unfortunately, there is none and the blast is successful in this case.

Rule of law, the mantra for a democratic state, encompasses weighing mitigating circumstances before passing an order. Refusing to abide by this principle could amount to succumbing to such principles of governance which are detrimental for a healthy democratic state that’s known for its vibrant media. It would be better to put a suspect channel on probation before disconnecting its lifeline.