Supreme Court for guidelines to regulate electronic media

The Supreme Court today asked the Central government if there are any guidelines to regulate electronic media in the country. The court issued notice to the government after a devotee of Aasaram Baapu moved to Supreme Court saying that the news channels should be restrained from telecasting biased and one sided news about the death of four students in the institutions run by the Sant Aasaram Bapu trust.

Appearing for petitioner R P Arora, senior advocate Mukul Rohtagi lashed out at electronic media saying that there should be some mechanism to control the content on electronic media. Accusing the news channels of one sided reporting Rohtagi contended before the court "TV has the capacity of influence large number of people in the society. At least they should have taken our version so that out spokesperson could have denied our involvement in the deaths of the students".

Rohatagi also mentioned about Aarushi murder case saying TV channels did an irreparable damage to Dr. Talwar's reputation. He also mentioned about Delhi school teacher Uma Khurana saying she was a victim of a fake sting operation. On this Justice P Sathasivam who was sharing the bench with the Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan asked why they do not exploit legal remedies available to them. To this, Rohatagi contended that by the time they will take legal recourse, the damage would already be done.