A number of facts not presented before SC: Congress on court relief to TV news anchor

After the Supreme Court restrained state authorities from taking coercive steps against TV news anchor Rohit Ranjan, the Congress on Friday said a number of facts have not been presented before it and pointed out that it was an ''ex-parte'' order.

The matter pertains to airing of a doctored clip of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said many of the facts that were not presented should be brought to the attention of the Supreme Court.

''It may also be noted that the Supreme Court has neither stayed the investigation nor made any remarks on the same. It may also be noted that no stay order has been pronounced in the complaint against the BJP leaders who continued to spread the fake and divisive content,'' he alleged in a statement.

''For the Indian National Congress' part, this redoubles our resolve to invoke the law against all purveyors of hate and fake news and to pursue the matter to the fullest extent permissible under the law,'' Ramesh said.

Responding to the Supreme Court's order on the Zee News anchor, the Congress leader said complaints were filed against him and FIRs were registered and the states where the FIRs were filed have now been issued notice and asked to file their replies by the top court.

''They were not present nor required to be present. The order is thus what is known in legal language as an 'ex-parte order', giving full opportunity to the states concerned to file replies and to appear on the next date,'' he said.

In a relief to TV news anchor Rohit Ranjan, the Supreme Court on Friday restrained various state authorities from taking coercive steps against him to take him in custody in connection with multiple FIRs for playing a doctored clip of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi during the telecast of a programme on July 1.

The interim protection to the news anchor came from a vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and J K Maheshwari which also issued notices to the Centre and states of Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh seeking their responses on Ranjan’s plea for quashing of complaints or FIRs concerning the telecast.

“Issue notice. Service on the Union of India be effected through the office of the Central Agency,” the bench said. “In the meanwhile, there will be an interim order restraining the respondent-authorities from taking coercive steps against the petitioner to take him into custody in connection with the anchoring/telecast of DNA on July 1, 2022,” the top court said in its order.

The apex court was hearing the plea of the anchor who is facing FIRs in some states.