The editors of two tabloids, who were facing arrest for breach of privilege, will now not be arrested. But, they will have to appear personally before the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly to submit a plea to reconsider the Assembly’s resolution of sentencing them to one-year imprisonment. This was conveyed by the counsel for the Speaker to the Karnataka High Court on Saturday.
Additional Advocate-General A.S. Ponnanna, who represents the Speaker, told the court that he had consulted the Speaker and the Chief Minister and he was instructed to inform the court that the Speaker will receive the editors’ pleas for reconsidering the resolution passed by the Assembly, if they personally appear before the Speaker.
The AAG clarified that the editors would not be arrested.
Later, counsel for the editors — Ravi Belagere of Hi Bangalore and Anil Raj of Yelahanka Voice — submitted a memo saying the petitioner-editors would personally appear before the Speaker on July 3 to submit a petition for reconsidering the Assembly’s resolution. The counsel also sought court’s permission to withdraw the petition. These submissions were made on the court’s advice to find an amicable solution to the controversy cropped following Assembly June 21 resolution.
Orally observing that “he is happy” to see the issue resolved, Justice Ashok B. Hinchigeri disposed of the petitions in which the legality of the Assembly’s resolution was questioned, while giving liberty to the petitioner-editors for reviving the petition, if needed.
Background
Three MLAs — K.B. Koliwad (presently Speaker of the House), S.R. Vishwanath, and B.M. Nagaraj had in 2014-15 complained to the then Speaker that the two editors had breached the privileges of the legislators by publishing “defamatory and false” reports against them. Their complaints were referred to the Committee of Privileges, which had recommended imposition of a one-year prison sentence and ₹10,000 fine on the editors.
However, the editors moved the court saying the articles were related to the role of the MLAs outside the Legislative Assembly, and it does not come under the jurisdiction of the legislature under breach of privileges, but could only attract criminal case for defamation, which had already been initiated against them by the MLAs.
Meanwhile, the authorities had claimed that the editors were evading arrest. However, the court, on Friday, had expressed serious displeasure over the conduct of the police when it was brought to its notice that relatives of the editors were “harassed” by the police as two of their relatives were slapped with criminal cases.
