Sunday, Nov 09, 2003
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By J. Venkatesan
The petition was moved before Justice R.C. Lahoti by senior counsel, Harish Salve, late in the evening since both the Chief Justice, V.N. Khare, and the next senior judge, Justice S. Rajendra Babu, were out of town. Considering the urgency of the matter, Mr. Justice Lahoti directed that it be listed as the first item before a Bench comprising Justice Y.K. Sabharwal and Justice S.B. Sinha. The other petitioners are: the Executive Editor, Malini Parthasarathy, the Managing Director, S. Rangarajan, the Chief of Bureau, Tamil Nadu, V. Jayanth, and Special Correspondent, Radha Venkatesan. Soon after the petition was directed to be listed for hearing, Mr. Salve told reporters that since the Supreme Court was now seized of the matter, it was expected that the authorities would show restraint and wait for the outcome of the order. The petitioners sought a direction to declare the resolution passed by the Tamil Nadu Assembly on November 7 against them as illegal and void and to quash the warrant issued by the Speaker for arresting them. An interim direction to restrain the police both in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka (where a posse of police from Tamil Nadu are camping) from executing the warrants issued by the Speaker was also sought. The Assembly resolution said that an editorial published in The Hindu on April 25, 2003 was written in a manner causing breach of privilege of the action of the Assembly Speaker who was the custodian of the House, as well as the action of the Privileges Committee and in the primary process imputing ulterior motives to the House as a whole. It held that The Hindu Editor and four others had committed a punishable offence of breach of privilege of the House and sentenced them to undergo 15 days' simple imprisonment. Assailing the resolution, the petitioners contended that the Assembly, without granting any opportunity to them to be heard in person by the Privileges Committee, had violated the principles of natural justice and breached the promise that they would be given an opportunity to be heard in person. The petitioners submitted that it would be relevant to note that the Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, made a statement in the Assembly that she was not interested in pursuing another resolution in respect of three reports which related to her and accordingly the proceedings were dropped. However, the resolution passed in respect of an Editorial sentenced all the five petitioners. The petitioners argued that the resolution was contrary to and violative of their fundamental rights under Articles 19 (1) (a) and 21 of the Constitution. Honest and courageous reporting by the press was the bedrock of parliamentary democracy. It would be impossible for them to fulfil their responsibility as members of the Fourth Estate in an atmosphere of fear and terror. They said that they were being prosecuted for fair and accurate reporting of the proceedings of the Assembly. They drew the attention of the court to the filing of 16 defamation cases against The Hindu for reporting the events fairly and accurately. Further, the Legislative Rules governing the reference to the Privileges Committee had been ignored and the petitioners had been held guilty without following the proper procedure. It would be relevant to mention that the Speaker had prejudged the issue and passed damaging remarks on the publications of The Hindu while referring the matter to the Privileges Committee. They said the powers of the State Legislatures under Article 194 of the Constitution must be read in harmony with Article 21 (protection of life and personal liberty) and could not be construed as authorising any authority of the State to arrest and detain a person. They cited various decisions of the apex court which had clearly held that the power of the privilege of the Legislature would have to be harmonised with the fundamental rights of the citizens. Hence they prayed for quashing the impugned resolution and restraining the police in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka from executing the arrest warrants against them considering the fact that several police teams had been sent to various States to nab them.
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