Lakshmi Venu, TAFE withdraw suits in Bengaluru court seeking media gag

TAFE Vice Chairperson Lakshmi Venu and tractor manufacturer TAFE on Thursday withdrew two suits before a Bengaluru civil court seeking restrictions on allegedly defamatory reporting and removal of online content.

Additional City Civil and Sessions Court, Bengaluru dismissed both suits as not pressed after counsel filed memos conveying that the proceedings would not be pursued.

“He filed memo not pressing the present suit. Therefore, allowing the memo, the present suit is dismissed as not pressed,” the Court recorded in both matters.

The cases were advanced at the plaintiffs’ request. The orders recorded that counsel was present and filed the memos. Neither order stated the reason for the decision not to pursue the suits.

The withdrawals came after the Court had, on October 15, issued summons and notice to the defendants on applications for interim injunctions. It had decided to hear the defendants before passing orders on the requested relief and fixed December 5 as the returnable date.

No interim injunction was granted under those October orders.

Both suits sought restrictions on allegedly false and unverified reporting concerning TAFE, its stakeholders and board members. The requested restraints covered publication, circulation, sharing, hosting and streaming of content, including broadcasts, debates and story coverage through print, satellite and digital media.

The applications also sought removal of content identified in scheduled URLs and directions to de-index and de-reference those links, making them non-searchable across search engines, internal platform searches, publishers and intermediaries.

The suit by Lakshmi Venu additionally sought restrictions on publication, reuse or exploitation of material concerning the dissolution of her marriage, including her photographs in that context. It also sought removal of content identified in a separate schedule.

The defendants in that proceeding included Moneycontrol, Financial Express, Times of India, Outlook Business, Lokmat, News24 and Kannada Prabha, among other publications.

X Corp, Google LLC, Meta Platforms, Instagram, Facebook and Threads were also named, along with unidentified parties described as “Ashok Kumar John Doe”.

TAFE’s separate suit additionally sought restrictions on content stating or imputing that the company, its directors, officers or employees indulged in bribery or corruption.

Both proceedings now stand withdrawn without an adjudication on whether the challenged content was defamatory.

[Read Orders]