New Delhi, March 29 (). The Delhi High Court on Wednesday set aside the summoning order issued by a magistrate’s court in criminal defamation proceedings initiated by Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) professor Amita Singh against news publication The Wire.
In 2016, Singh filed a criminal defamation case against The Wire, its editor Siddharth Varadarajan and reporter Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprastha.
Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani, who was hearing the matter, passed it observing that there was no material before the Magistrate in support of the summoning order.
The Single-Judge Bench held that, in corollary to the above, the summoning order dated 07.01.2017 made by the learned Metropolitan Magistrate in Criminal Complaint bearing CC No. 32203/2016 cannot be sustained in law and is accordingly set aside. goes.
Justice Bhambhani also noted that the publication neither claimed that Singh was involved in any wrongdoing nor did it speak about the respondent (Singh) in any derogatory or derogatory terms.
Singh’s case arose out of a story published by a news portal, which stated that a group of JNU professors had prepared a 200-page dossier alleging the university was a den of organized sex rackets.
According to The Wire, the dossier was titled Jawaharlal Nehru University: A hotbed of separatism and terrorism and it was said that Singh, who is a professor at the Center for Law and Governance, was leading the faculty group that prepared the report.
The Wire’s story said the report in question was submitted to the university’s administration and accused some of its teachers of encouraging a decadent culture in JNU and legitimizing separatist movements in India.
The Wire was represented by Senior Advocate Nitya Ramakrishnan along with Advocates Rahul Kriplani, Ri Bhalla and Supraja V and Advocate Alok Kumar Rai appeared for the Respondent.
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