Karnataka HC convicts magazine editor, reporter in defamation case

The Karnataka High Court on Monday held that the offence of defamation was complete unless not covered under the exceptions such as public good or good faith.

Relying on observations by the Supreme Court on defamation, the high court convicted an editor and a reporter of a local newspaper in Bhatkal and in another case dismissed the criminal revision petition filed by an editor of Mangaluru-based evening newspaper.

In the first case, the high court reversed the trial court order and convicted Ganesh P, editor and publisher of “Kadala Koogu,” a weekly magazine in Bhatkal in Uttara Kannada and its reporter Raghavendra R Bhat.

A teacher from Bhatkal had filed a complaint against the journalists for writing an article defaming her character. The trial court though accepted that the article was objectionable, acquitted the two accused in 2011.

Justice N G Uma, while setting aside the order of the trial court, observed, “The conduct of the accused in using objectionable and defamatory words only to have rhyming caption and the article is not at all acceptable and therefore both the accused are liable to be convicted.” The bench ordered the accused to pay a fine of Rs 30,000 each. The court also ordered to deposit an amount of Rs 50,000 of the fine amount, in favour of the complainant as compensation.

In another case, Justice H B Prabhakara Sastry dismissed a criminal revision petition filed by B S Shivaprasad, printer, publisher and acting editor of “Karavali Ale” and Canara Times in Mangaluru.

The complainant in the case, Mangalore Catholic Cooperative Bank Ltd, had moved the court for two articles published in the year 2000. The complainant stated that there was no evidence for the allegations made in the articles. Shivaprasad was held guilty by the trial court in 2005 which was confirmed by the sessions court in Dakshina Kannada in 2010.

The high court bench held that a publisher of a defamatory statement can only be protected if he shows that he had taken all reasonable precautions and then had a reasonable and well-grounded belief in the truth of the statement.