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TMI Blog2017 (3) TMI 1341X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... I refrain from returning a final finding on the said aspect being of the view that the suit of the plaintiff is otherwise not maintainable. X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Kalindi is a trainee under the PMKVY who underwent training at the plaintiff's training centre in District Hailakandi, Assam; (vi) that the primary feature of PMKVY is that after the completion of the training of the trainee, NSDC credits a pre-decided amount in consensus with the respective Skill Sector Council in the bank account of the trainee; a fixed ratio from the said amount is automatically debited from the savings account of the trainee and credited to the current account of the training partner as training fees; (vii) further, under PMKVY, Bank of India is the official banking partner of the NSDC and provides banking platform for implementation thereof; as a mandate the training partners as the plaintiff have to open current account with the Bank of India; similarly the trainee/student mandatorily needs to have a savings bank account with the Bank of India at the time of enrollment; the training fee credited to the bank account of the trainee after completion of the training is automatically debited from the savings account of the trainee and credited to the current account of the training partner; (viii) that the plaintiff has established training centres in various Dis ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... wastage of time they will get ₹ 5,000/- but ₹ 4,500/- was credited to the account of the plaintiff and only ₹ 500/- remained in the account of the tea estate workers and that though the defendant no.7 already had an account with the Bank of India but another account with the same bank was opened for the said purpose; (xvi) the aforesaid publication of wrong facts is in violation of the guidelines laid down by Editors Guild; (xvii) by publishing only one side of the story, the defendants have tried to malign the image of the plaintiff, its Directors and representatives; moreover an attempt has been made to spread misinformation about the PMKVY; (xviii) the plaintiff came to know about the aforesaid article when one of its employee stumbled upon it on www.google.com at the office of the plaintiff at New Delhi on the website www.samayikprasanga.in/epaper.php; (xix) the news article dated 21st November, 2016 reveals a completely false, misleading and fabricated factual matrix of the entire incident, in complete ignorance of the actual guidelines; the said article highlights that the defendant no.7 along with other 50 tea plantation workers were lured by the represent ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ivity of tea garden, skill development is being provided and those assembled would be given one week's training. Due to loss of earning for one week, those attending training would be given ₹ 5,000/- in their bank account. Despite bank account present, Primero representative said to open bank account in the Bank of India, Shibbari Road, Hailakandi Branch. Mili Kalindi said in the case that Serispore Tea Estate doesn't fall in purview of Bank of India. Tea Estate Manager, Bank of India manager and Primero representative asked and got thumb impressions on the documents. Mili Kalindi and other candidates said they have account in Hailakandi branch in other banks. Bank of India manager, garden estate manager said that other bank accounts would not be acceptable and it should be opened only in BOI, Shibbari Road, Hailakandi branch. As a result trainees in one way were compelled listening to the accused to give thumb impression on various documents. Post this training continued for a week. After some days of completion of training, Serispore tea estate manager Gurmeet Singh Pahwa informed that ₹ 5,000/- has been deposited in every trainee's account. As a result poor hard wor ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... Khudiram Rikiyasan, has come to Thana with this issue. IO Laskar has said that on Monday BOI Hailakandi premises would be visited for further investigation. On the other hand, Krishan Mukti Sangram Samiti, Hailakandi District, Secretary Jahir Uddin Lashkar, Serispore Sakha Committee, Secretary Udinbod Bhudiya, Deputy Secretary Nanda Kalindi and Secretary Abdul Salam Ansari jointly said that tea garden workers are eligible for ₹ 4,500/- to be returned has been submitted to garden management." 6. The plaintiff has not placed before this Court the complaint filed by the defendant no.7 with the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Hailakandi, Assam or the FIR registered thereon. It is however not the case of the plaintiff that what is published in the impugned article is not the true narration of the contents of the complaint or of the FIR. 7. On a reading of the English translation aforesaid of the impugned article it was felt that the defendants no. 1 to 6 therein had in their role as Journalist/News Reporter only reported the filing of the complaint, the registration of the FIR and the investigation thereon by the Police officials as a news event. It was thus enquired from the counsel ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... s a training partner and thus the allegations of the defendants published in the impugned article are false and defamatory of the plaintiff. 10. The aforesaid argument of the counsel for the plaintiff misses the charge which the defendant no.7 has levied against the plaintiff and which is the subject matter of legal proceedings initiated against the plaintiff in Assam. The case of the defendant no.7 is that the plaintiff lures the labourers to the training scheme with the promise of their account being credited with ₹ 5,000/- and without disclosing that ₹ 4,500/- would be automatically debited therefrom. 11. It was further put to the counsel for the plaintiff, whether not complaints to the Police Authorities enjoy absolute privilege and there can be no defamatory action with respect thereto and whether not the remedy in such a case is of action of malicious prosecution only. 12. No reply in this respect was forthcoming from the counsel for the plaintiff nor has anything in this respect been stated in the written arguments filed by the plaintiff and taken on record; rather the said written arguments are a re-production of the contents of the plaint save reliance towar ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... c) It is not as if the direction aforesaid of the Supreme Court is without regard to the reputation of the persons complained against in the FIR. The law of defamation, which as far as India is concerned is uncodified and based on common law, has always recognised certain situations as privileged, words spoken or written wherein cannot furnish a cause of action for a claim on account of defamation. Supreme Court in Raja Ram Pal Vs. Hon'ble Speaker, Lok Sabha (2007) 3 SCC 184 held that the term "privilege in law" is defined as an immunity or an exemption from some duty, burden, attendance or liability conferred by special grant in derogation of common right. The term "privilege" was stated to be derived from an expression "privilegium" which means a law specially passed in favour of or against a particular person. (d) The reason is that the law recognises those situations as where a person should have freedom of speech, without being under the fear of being hauled up subsequently for defamation. (e) As far back as in Golap Jan Vs. Bholanath Khettry MANU/WB/0056/1911 it was held by the Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court that though defamation is a good cause of action but ev ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ive their testimony. (f) Subsequently, in Anjana Saikia (Das) Vs. Anuradha Das 2003 SCC OnLine Gau 321 it was held that though an action for defamation by statement in the FIR would lie but only after the FIR case was decided. Similarly, in Mahavir Singh Vs. Surinder Singh 2010 SCC OnLine P&H 9094 also it was held that mere lodging of the FIR, though it may contain false imputation, does not amount to defaming the person against whom FIR is lodged. To the same effect is Kamlesh Kaur Vs. Lakhwinder Singh 2008 SCC OnLine P&H 920. (g) A learned Single Judge of the High Court of Madras in A.N. Shanmugam Vs. G. Saravanan 2015 SCC OnLine Mad 728 held the filing of a suit for defamation in such circumstances to be a process to escape from criminal prosecution and to make the defendant to come to terms. It was held that if every complainant who lodges the complaint with law enforcing agency is to face civil cases for defamation on the premise that the imputations made in the complaint according to the accused are false, many people fearing such actions on the part of the accused may not come forward to lodge a complaint to the law enforcing agency. It was further held that when an imputa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... al should be open and public; it is only when the public is excluded from audience that the privilege of publication also goes because the public outside then have no right to obtain at second- hand what they cannot obtain in the court itself. It was yet further held that if the matter is already published in open court, it cannot be prevented from being published outside the court room provided the report is a verbatim or a fair account. (k) I have already hereinabove noticed that it is not the plea of the plaintiff that what has been published by the defendant Nos. 1 to 6 in their newspaper is not a fair account of the complaint and the FIR lodged by the defendant no.7. (l) The Division Bench of the High Court of Bombay in Saroj Iyer Vs. Maharashtra Medical of Indian Medicine, Bombay 2002 (1) Mh.L.J. 737 held that the Medical Council being a Quasi Judicial Tribunal and the inquiry before it being quasi judicial in nature, there can be no blanket ban for public in attending the enquiry proceedings. (m) This Court in Mother Dairy Foods and Processing Ltd. Vs. ZEE Telefilms Ltd. ILR (2005) 1 Delhi 87 was concerned with an application for interim relief in a suit by a major suppli ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... held that the inaccuracy of reporting of court proceedings will be a contempt of court only if it can be said on the facts of a particular case, to amount to substantial interference with the administration of justice; that the privilege granted under Section 4 of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971 in favour of the person who makes a fair and accurate publication is based on the presumption of "open justice" in courts which permits fair and accurate reports of Court proceedings to be published. It was held that the media has a right to know what is happening in courts and to disseminate the information to the public which enhances the public confidence in the transparency of court proceedings. It follows from the said judgment that postponement of publication of court proceedings can be applied for to the same court in which the proceedings are pending and not to another court. I am in fact at pains to understand in what context the counsel for the plaintiff has relied on the said judgment. As far as reliance on Swatanter Kumar supra is concerned, the law as expounded and noticed above was noticed therein also but in the facts of that case interim injunction was granted. The same als ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ia. It was held (a) that the fundamental right of freedom of speech and expression requires free flow of opinion and ideas and an informed citizenry is a pre-condition for meaningful governance and the culture of open dialogue is generally of great societal importance and the ultimate truth is evolved by free trade in ideas in a competitive marketplace of ideas; (b) that it is only beyond a certain threshold that Article 19(2) is kicked in; and, (c) that wider reach and range of circulation over internet cannot justify restriction of freedom of speech and expression on that ground alone and that virtues of electronic media cannot become its enemies. (u) Applying the tests aforesaid also, no cause of action in favour of plaintiff or against any of defendants is disclosed. (v) Supreme Court in Pearlite Liners (P) Ltd. Vs. Manorama Sirsi (2004) 3 SCC 172 was concerned with a suit for specific performance of a contract of personal service. The same was dismissed by the trial court and the first appellate court on a preliminary issue as to the maintainability thereof but was in second appeal restored by the High Court and remanded for trial. Supreme Court held that once the reliefs cl ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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