In a major relief to Kal Cables Pvt. Ltd., the Madras High Court on Friday set aside an August 20 order of the Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry cancelling the MSO’s licence.
However, the court said its order would not preclude the Centre from taking action as per law on the basis of information available with it. Any action could be initiated, but according to due process, either against the petitioner and/or against television channels that formed part of the same group and about the manner in which permission was granted in September 2006, when one of the promoters was the Union Minister, “and/or about the circumstances under which the file relating to the permission granted was kept back for seven years since 2006 from the Union Home Ministry.”
Justice V. Ramasubramanian passed the order on a petition by the MSO challenging the order. The MSO said the cancellation had been done suddenly without any show-cause notice. The judge said the notings in the Home Ministry file concluded that there were no adverse reports against the directors or key executives of the company.
If the information available in the file about the alleged activities of the company’s promoters were not considered to be a ground for invoking Section 20 (2) of the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act against the TV channels promoted by the very same persons, “I do not know how the same information would disentitle the petitioner to security clearance just for the continuance of registration as an MSO, whose role was very limited and smaller than that of a commercial television channel,” the judge said.
