The Gujarat High Court has directed The Indian Express and The Times of India to publish a public apology for inaccurately reporting the court’s proceedings during a hearing related to challenges against amendments to the Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Act. The apology is to be prominently displayed on the front page of their respective newspapers by Friday.
Background and Court’s Observations
The issue arose from the hearing of a batch of petitions filed by various linguistic and religious minority schools. On August 13, the High Court, in its order, had issued notices to the editors of The Times of India, The Indian Express, and the Gujarati newspaper Divya Bhaskar, questioning whether they had verified their reports with any court officer before publishing them. The reports were alleged to have sensationalized the court’s observations, creating a misleading impression that the court had already formed an opinion on the matters under consideration.
Proceedings on August 22
During the hearing on August 22, the bench, comprising Chief Justice Sunita Agarwal and Justice Pranav Trivedi, expressed dissatisfaction with the newspapers’ actions. During the hearing on Thursday, the Chief Justice orally said to the counsel appearing for the newspapers, “If you admit that there is a mistake then first publish a public apology in your newspaper in bold letters referring to that article, and then making a statement that whatever statement you have made in those articles were wrong statements made on your part. And don’t write this kind of apology. It should be unconditional apology…no one has tendered an unconditional apology in the newspaper”. The Chief Justice emphasized that the public should be made aware of the mistake, stating, “You have given a wrong impression to the public. Tendering an apology to us is not helping you. There should be a public apology to the public at large to whom you have given a wrong message by way of your newspaper article.”
The senior counsel representing the newspapers admitted the error and agreed to publish the apology by the date set by the court. The court mandated that the apology must be published in bold letters on the front page so that it is visible to all readers.
Further Actions and Consequences
The High Court also granted the newspapers additional time to file a more comprehensive affidavit, which must include the published apology. For Divya Bhaskar, which had not responded to the court’s earlier notice, the High Court issued a fresh notice demanding an explanation as to why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against it.
Court’s Stern Stance on Misreporting
The bench was particularly critical of the fact that three different newspapers had published similar misleading reports, suggesting a coordinated effort rather than an isolated mistake. The court reiterated that there is a significant difference between the court’s observations, findings, and the conversations during proceedings, and that reporting must reflect these distinctions accurately.
With respect to the publication in “Divya Bhaskar”, the high court dictated in its order, “As there is no response we issue notice to the editors of Divya Bhaskar to answer as to why contempt proceedings be not drawn against them for wilful violation of the directions contained in order dated 13-8-2024. the notice be served upon editors of Divya Bhaskar through the office of registrar general high court within a period of two days from today. The response be submitted by September 2″.
The court thereafter listed the hearing of the main batch matter on August 27.
Before parting the senior counsel said, “I can assure based on discussion I had…there is no doubt it had slipped through chains of protocol it should not have“. Referring to the content of the three articles including the heading, the high court however orally said that this did not appear to be mistake.
“Three newspapers making the same mistake…It is not acceptable. Its not so simple. It is not a mistake. This was a properly coordinated effort…it is not acceptable three newspapers writing the same thing in the same way. Only language was different. The tenor of three articles were same. Three reports was crafted in the same manner,” the high court orally said.
Case Reference
- Case Title: Mount Carmel High School & Anr. v/s State of Gujarat & Ors and batch
- Court: Gujarat High Court
