Calling CESC ‘Tughlaqi company’ defamatory: HC after 20yr legal battle
Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court has held that branding CESC Limited a “Tughlaqi company” and portraying it as a “mafia” indulging in “goondami” in a television programme amounted to defamatory content built on distorted facts, bringing to a close a 20-year-old legal battle.
The bench of Justice Krishna Rao noted that the broadcasts were not mere criticism but contained defamatory and abusive language coupled with a deliberate misrepresentation of facts, which harmed the reputation of the power utility among consumers and the public.
The dispute dates back to 2004, when a Bengali programme aired a series of episodes alleging illegal activities and extortion by CESC. The telecasts repeatedly used expressions such as “mafia-giri”, “zoolumbazi” and “big thief” and depicted company officials in a derogatory manner, including caricatures designed to ridicule them.
According to the court record, even after CESC officials gave an interview explaining that the allegations were untrue, the programme failed to present the clarification and instead repeated the earlier content. The company subsequently issued a legal notice seeking withdrawal of the telecasts, but the broadcasts continued, prompting the defamation suit.
The producers defended the programme as an exercise in investigative journalism carried out in good faith, while the anchor claimed he had no editorial control and merely read from scripts.
However, while the plaintiff led evidence in support of its case, the defendants did not adduce any evidence.
Eventually, all defendants submitted unconditional written apologies, acknowledging that the broadcasts had wrongly projected facts, misled viewers and caused reputational harm.
They also informed the court that the programme had long been taken off air and the content was no longer in circulation.
Taking note of the apology, the long pendency of the suit since 2004, and the overall circumstances, the court accepted the apology but directed the defendants to pay token damages of Rs 1000 each, along with Rs 5000 as costs.
