MediaOne Case Adjourned To May 4 After Center Seeks Time To Decide Contents Of Counter Affidavit At 'Very Senior Level'

The Supreme Court today adjourned the appeal of MediaOne against the Judgment of Kerala High Court to May 4, after the Center circulated a letter seeking adjournment by four weeks.

The letter circulated by the Center said that the contents of its counter affidavit had to be "decided at a very senior level which is likely to take some time".   

The case was listed before the Bench of Justice D. Y. Chandrachud, Justice Surya Kant and Justice Sanjiv Khanna. 

Earlier, a Bench of Justice D. Y. Chandrachud, Justice Surya Kant and Justice Vikram Nath had earlier stayed the restriction by the Central Government on the telecast of MediaOne. Accordingly, the channel had resumed its telecast, which was limited to live streaming on youtube pursuant to the Judgment of the Single Judge of the Kerala High Court. 

Madhyamam Broadcasting Ltd., the company that owns the Malayalam news channel MediaOne, had filed an appeal against the Judgment of the Division Bench of Kerala High Court dismissing its appeal against the Single Judge's Judgment upholding the restriction on the telecast of the channel. The licence for telecasting MediaOne was due to expire on 29th September 2021 when the channel applied for renewal of the licence on 30th May 2021 and was served with a show-cause notice for revoking permission and later on 31st January 2022 an order revoking the permission was passed on the grounds of national security and public order.

The channel filed a writ petition before a Single Judge of the Kerala High Court and obtained an interim order permitting them to continue telecasting. However, the Single Bench dismissed the writ petition after calling for and perusing the files of the Home Ministry. The appeal filed by the Channel before the Division Bench of the High Court was also dismissed.

The Division Bench had held after perusing the files of the Home Ministry that there are "certain serious adverse reports by the Intelligence Bureau against M/s.Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited and its Managing Director." Against the said order, the channel had approached the Supreme Court, inter alia, contending that direction of the Division Bench to produce the files relating to the application of the channel for renewal of its license was passed behind its back.