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New Delhi: Up to 34 major Bollywood producers and four film industry associations filed a lawsuit in the Delhi High Court on Monday, seeking to prevent television channels from making “irresponsible, derogatory and defamatory comments” against the Hindi film industry.
The lawsuit has been filed against Republic Television Editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami and channel journalist Pradeep Bhandari, and Times Now’s Editor-in-chief Rahul Shivshankar and his prominent presenter Navika Kumar as respondents.
Production companies include those run by Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Karan Johar, Farhan Akhtar, and Ajay Devgn.
They have come under fire for conducting media trials of Bollywood personalities and interfering with the right to privacy of individuals associated with the film industry, in the wake of the death of Sushant Singh Rajput and the subsequent arrest of his girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty.
“The livelihood of those associated with Bollywood is seriously affected by the smear campaign carried out by the defendants. This is in addition to the ongoing pandemic that has resulted in extreme earnings and loss of job opportunities, ”reads the lawsuit filed by the law firm DSK Legal.
“The privacy of Bollywood members is being invaded and their reputations are being irreparably damaged by painting all of Bollywood as criminals, seeping into drug culture and making being a part of Bollywood synonymous with criminal acts in the public imagination.” .
Read also: How did leaked Bollywood ‘drug chats’ affect WhatsApp? Your downloads saw a jump of 25,000 / day
News channels use objectionable expressions
Bollywood producers have clarified that they are not seeking a total ban on coverage related to the Rajput investigation. They have requested a permanent court order against the respondents “to carry out reports and publications of material that violates applicable laws.”
Objections have also been raised about the nature of the reports and the publication of details of what the producers described as “parallel private investigations”.
The lawsuit claimed that the defendants acted as “courts” to convict Bollywood-related individuals, based on what they claimed was “evidence” found by them. By doing so, according to the lawsuit, respondents were trying to poke fun at the criminal justice system.
The producers have also signaled their protest against the use of objectionable expressions and phrases in the reports shown on the two news channels when they claimed that a drug cartel operates in the film industry.
Some of the phrases to which the petitioners have objected are “dirt”, “filth”, “scum” and “drug addicts”. Similarly, expressions like “it is Bollywood where you have to clean the dirt”, “all the perfumes of Arabia cannot remove the stench and stench of this filth and scum from the belly of Bollywood”, “this is the dirtiest industry in the country “, and” Bollywood drenched in cocaine and LSD “have been highlighted as objectionable.
According to the lawsuit, the news channels have “openly circumvented” the Program Code framed in Section 5 of the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act of 1995 contained in Rule 6 of the Cable Television Networks Rules. 1994.
Read also: Don’t look at everyone in the Bollywood industry with the same lens, says actor Akshay Kumar
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