New Delhi, February 10, 2023 (PPI-OT):The Indian Supreme Court has dismissed a plea seeking to impose a complete ban on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in India in wake of its documentary exposing the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi’s role in the anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat state in 2002. A bench comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna and M M Sundresh passed the order, today, while hearing a plea filed by Vishnu Gupta, president of the Hindutva organization Hindu Sena, and Beerendra Kumar Singh, a farmer. “The writ petition is entirely misconceived and has no merit and is accordingly dismissed,” the bench said.
At the outset, Justice Khanna observed, “It is completely misconceived, absolutely meritless. How can you even argue this? I feel it is absolutely misconceived”. On February 3, the apex court had sought responses from the Indian government and others on the separate petitions challenging its decision to block the documentary ‘India: The Modi Question’. The pleas, on which notice was issued by the top court, have been filed by veteran journalist N Ram, Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra, activist lawyer Prashant Bhushan and lawyer M L Sharma.
The top court had on February 3 also directed the Indian government to produce original records relating to its decision to block the BBC documentary. On January 21, the Modi government had issued directions for blocking multiple YouTube videos and Twitter posts sharing links to the documentary.
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