Delhi High Court recalls gag order on The Wire's coverage of ex-Delhi Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar

The Delhi High Court on Monday recalled its interim order injuncting online news portal The Wire from publishing allegedly defamatory articles on Delhi Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar, in relation to the land acquisition by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) for the Dwarka Expressway project.

Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani stated that courts cannot act as a "soothsayer" by predicting if future articles of an author would be defamatory.

"Moreover, to assume that what someone may publish would be defamatory, is egregiously hypothetical and presumptive; and therefore cannot be the basis of a court injunction. No matter how perspicacious a court may be, it cannot act as a soothsayer and predict what an author may publish next, and presume it to be offensive to a party, and thereby gag what is yet to be put-out in the public.”

The Court stated that the gag order was "over-broad, presumptive in nature and based purely on a hypothetical situation".

"..there is no conceivable way, whether in fact or in law, by which it can be presumed that what an author or publisher is proposing to publish would be defamatory, even going by any past publication that may have been made by the author/publisher."

The defamation suit pertains to The Wire's report on November 9, 2023 titled 'Links of son of Delhi Chief Secretary to Beneficiary's Family in Land Over-Valuation Case Raise Questions.' The report said that Naresh Kumar's son Karan Chauhan had links with a family which benefited from the hiked compensation when a plot of land measuring 19 acre in Delhi's Bamnoli village was acquired by the NHAI for the Dwarka Expressway.

Kumar then filed a defamation suit before the High Court against The Wire and reporter Meetu Jain.

In a November 2023 order, Justice Sachin Datta had observed that the nexus sought to be drawn in the article between the beneficiaries of the arbitral award [enhanced compensation] and Kumar’s son was quite far-fetched. Thereby, the Court came to a prima facie conclusion that the article was a “litany of misrepresentations and convoluted insinuations made in a reckless manner, without any regard for the truth, and with a view to inflict damage” Kumar’s reputation.

Justice Datta had ordered The Wire and Jain to take down the article as well as the tweets/posts circulated on X (formerly Twitter). It also restrained them from publishing any further defamatory allegations related to the story.

“The defendant nos. 1 and 2 [The Wire and Meetu Jain] are further directed to not post, circulate or publish any similar defamatory content against the plaintiff as set out in the impugned article/publication dated 09.11.2023.”

In the judgment passed today, Justice Bhambhani set aside this direction.

"In these circumstances, this court is of the view that the ad-interim directions issued in para 30(iii) of judgment dated 22.11.2023 are required to be recalled. Para 30(iii) of judgment dated 22.11.2023 is accordingly deleted."

The Court said that it was not inclined to interfere with the order to take down the allegedly defamatory articles, as they have already been taken down.

Senior Advocate Manik Dogra and Advocates Bani Dikshit, Dhruv Pandey, Uddhav Khanna and Dhruva Viz appeared for Naresh Kumar.

Senior Advocate Nitya Ramakrishnan with Advocates Sarin Naved, Stuti Rai, Saurabh Sagar, Md Zeeshan Ahmad, Md Noumaan, Deepak Gogia, Aadhar Nautiyal, Aditya Mathur and Anuparna Chatterjee appeared for The Wire and Jain.

[Read Judgment]