Karnataka | As Prajwal case shows, gag orders on media benefit the high and mighty

At the first whiff of impending trouble, politicians in Karnataka, many with tainted reputation, obtain judicial gag orders on the media, preventing the public from learning about their unsavoury conduct. Journalists, unfortunately, are not protesting enough.

Naturally, the civil society in Karnataka is aghast that it was one such judicial order that stopped people from knowing the murky details of sexual misconduct by JD(S) leader Prajwal Revanna, grandson of former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda. Now that the details are out, it has led to a political tsunami.

Prajwal Revanna case

On June 2, 2023 the Principal City Civil and Sessions Court ordered 89 news outlets from publishing what it said was “defamatory” content about Revanna, Lok Sabha member from Hassan since 2019.

This prevented the people of Hassan and the rest of Karnataka from coming to know about his activities ahead of April 26, when the constituency went to polls with Revanna as the BJP-JD(S) candidate. 

Since then, a whopping 2,000-odd clips of sexually explicit videos allegedly involving Prajwal have become public knowledge, forcing him to flee India and triggering widespread outrage not just in Karnataka but across India. 

Denial of rights

“These gag orders on the media have severe ramifications on the right to report fearlessly and the public right to know,” Clifton D’Rosario, general secretary of the All India Lawyers Association for Justice (AILAJ), told The Federal.

He pointed out that the Supreme Court had clarified that such orders were permissible only in exceptional circumstances, as they tended to stifle public debate.

Indeed, had the judiciary in Karnataka not intervened last year, the serious charges now hurled at Prajwal would have come out in the open much before this year’s Lok Sabha battle. He may have lost out on the candidature. The electorate may have made a more informed decision when it went to the polling booth.

Yet another political scion

Again, on April 26, KE Kanthesh, son of expelled BJP leader and former Deputy Chief Minister KS Eshwarappa, obtained a restraining order from the court to prevent 50 media houses from publishing any defamatory text or video clips against him.

Sources close to Eshwarappa said Kantesh took legal recourse fearing political repercussions for his father, who is contesting from the Shivamogga Lok Sabha constituency as an Independent against BY Raghavendra of the BJP.

M Vinod Kumar, advocate for Kanthesh, said an unknown person sent a morphed video of his client and a woman. This forced Kantesh to seek restraining orders on the media. “We responded with resolve and resilience and sought restraining orders,” Eshwarappa told The Federal.

Staggering gag order numbers

The overall scene in Karnataka is indeed disturbing.

Since 2013, a staggered 2,780 restraining orders have been brought against media houses. The beneficiaries include 19 BJP lawmakers, eight from the Congress and three from the JD(S), including Prajwal Revanna.

According to published reports, the Deccan Herald, a leading English daily in Karnataka, has been served as many as 516 gag orders in the past decade.

The Network of Women in Media India, along with many eminent personalities and journalists, have expressed concern over the raising trend of powerful people seeking and obtaining gag orders on the media.

Politicians’ might

Even the Supreme Court has raised concerns. A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud noted that such interim injunctions spell a death sentence to journalistic stories.

An analysis of the gag orders in Karnataka reveals that these are almost always granted to legislators. Last year, 18 of them got gag orders against media houses. Many orders were issued even before the publication of any article or story.

Suits seeking restraining orders went up during last year’s Assembly polls.

In March 2023, when BJP MLA Madalu Virupakshappa and his son Prashanth Kumar faced corruption charges, they brought a restraining order against 46 media houses, preventing them from publishing or broadcasting any news about it. 

Earlier events

According to legal experts, the tradition of seeking a restraining order started 38 years ago, when AK Subbaiah, the then Leader of Opposition in the Karnataka Legislative Council, criticised then Director General of Police BN Garudachar in the public sphere. The latter brought an interim order restraining Subbaiah from making such statements.

In March 2021, Ramesh Jarkiholi, a minister, brought a restraining order when an obscene video went viral on social media and reached the news channels. Similarly, when the news spread of similar videos of six BJP ministers, the ministers moved court and secured a gag order.

Bureaucrats seem to be a part of this game. When a personal and professional spat between IAS and IPS officers Rohini Sindhuri and Rupa Moudgil respectively blew up, the former filed a restraining order against the latter and media houses.

Tejaswi Surya, Siddaramaiah cases

BJP leader Tejaswi Surya, even before he got elected to the Lok Sabha for the first time in 2019, secured an injunction against 49 media houses after a woman accused him of sexual harassment. The Karnataka High Court set aside this order, observing that voters had a right to know everything about their candidates.

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is not an exception. He sought a restraining order to prevent the publication of a book titled Siddu Nija Kanasugalu ('The real dreams of Siddu'), allegedly portraying him in a bad light. The book was therefore not published.

This is, why, said D’Rosario, the courts “have to be conscious while considering the restraining order issues”.

Senior journalist and political analyst Preethi Nagaraj sought to know why people are seeking restraining orders from courts. “Gag orders on media houses is some sort of an assault on freedom of press. Why does someone get a gag order? And why are those orders given to individuals without even as much as understanding why they even approach the courts to restrain the media?" he asked.

Nagaraj added: “There should be some mechanism to inquire into the need for gag orders rather than just accepting their pleas. If an individual has done something unacceptable, there are a million ways to reach people now. Media houses look foolish when they don’t write what is already in public domain, legally or illegally.”