The Delhi High Court has awarded Rs 5 lakh as damages to TV Today Network for defamatory posts on X against the channel and its journalist Rajdeep Sardesai after it aired an interview with actor Rhea Chakraborty in 2020, Live Law reported on Friday.
Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav held that the X posts were “highly defamatory” and “remain unsubstantiated by the defendant, despite having been afforded sufficient opportunity”.
The case was filed by TV Today Network in 2020 against Anurag Srivastava, who runs the X handles @theanuragkts and @theanuragoffice.
Shortly after the interview was broadcast, Srivastava made X posts using derogatory language against Sardesai.
He also alleged that Chakraborty had bribed him and the network to conduct the interview.
Chakraborty was charged in a drugs case connected to actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death in 2020
TV Today Network said the posts were part of a “systematic attack” on Sardesai intended to lower the reputation of TV Today Network in the eyes of the public, Bar and Bench reported.
The network claimed that the posts harmed the organisation’s reputation and revenue.
The news channel submitted before the court that its total income decreased from Rs 899.57 crore in 2019-’20 to Rs 819.92 crore in 2020-’21, Bar and Bench reported.
Srivastava later deleted the posts and gave an undertaking not to repost them. Interim orders restraining him from publishing such content were passed in 2020.
The High Court has now directed him to also pay compensation to the network.
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