The petition was supposed to be listed for hearing today, according to senior attorney Siddharth Luthra, who is representing news anchor Rohit Ranjan. However, he argued that because it hasn't been on the agenda, it should be assigned to a bench on Friday.
Digital Desk: The Supreme Court was requested to hear a TV news anchor's plea for protection from coercive action for the claimed offence on Thursday. The news presenter is facing multiple FIRs in some states for showing a doctored film of Congressman Rahul Gandhi.
A vacation bench led by Justice Indira Banerjee stated it was "awaiting assignment from the CJI" after ordering the listing of the case for hearing on Wednesday.
We haven't been given that task. It is waiting for the chief justice to allocate it. Justice J K Maheshwari was also a member of the bench, and they both stated that it might not be assigned to us.
The petition was supposed to be listed for hearing today, according to senior attorney Siddharth Luthra, who is representing news anchor Rohit Ranjan. However, he argued that because it hasn't been on the agenda, it should be assigned to a bench on Friday.
"Let's check. The CJI has the case materials. The matter will be listed tomorrow, pending CJI approval, the bench declared.
The supreme court decided on Wednesday to hear the news anchor's appeal on Thursday. The news anchor is being investigated in many states after showing a manipulated film of Gandhi.
Later, Ranjan issued an apology, and the news show was cancelled.
According to Luthra, who also added that the anchor made a mistake in one of the shows and apologised for it, the report was retracted, "This individual was detained yesterday by UP police at Noida and freed on bail as the offence invoked was bailable."
Currently, the Chhattisgarh Police want to detain him. He will be held repeatedly if you don't list this quickly, the senior attorney pleaded.
The broadcaster was really taken into custody by the Noida police after a Chhattisgarh police squad showed up in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh, on Tuesday to arrest him at his home. Later that evening, the anchor was released on bail.
"Zee News anchor Rohit Ranjan was picked up from his home on Tuesday morning for questioning by a team from Noida Sector-20 police station in connection with a FIR lodged under IPC 505 (public mischief) on a complaint by his own channel over a doctored video played during his show on July 1," said a Noida police officer who asked to remain anonymous.
According to senior superintendent of police Prashant Agrawal in Raipur, a case was allegedly filed against Ranjan and others at Zee News on Sunday in response to a complaint made by Congress MLA Devendra Yadav for allegedly inciting hostility between various groups and upsetting people's religious sentiments.
In his complaint, Yadav said that on July 1, the TV station "mischievously" used a clip of Gandhi in which he called the attackers of his Wayanad office "children" and claimed he had no ill will toward them to imply that he was pardoning the men who killed Udaipur tailor Kanhaiya Lal.
IPC sections 153A (promote enmity between groups), 295A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to stir religious emotion of any class), 467 (forgery), 469 (forgery to harm reputation), and 504 (promote hatred between groups) were all cited in the Raipur FIR (intentional insult).
On July 2, the day after the video was shown, Ranjan apologised for misrepresenting Gandhi's comments and linking them with the Udaipur murder case.
"Our team apologises for the human error; it happened. He had tweeted in Hindi, "We regret it.
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