SC stays AMWJU’s complaint case

By Our Staff Reporter
IMPHAL, Sep 23: Of the two defamation cases filed by the All Manipur Working Journalists’ Union (AMWJU) and the Editors' Guild, Manipur (EGM) against the Editors Guild of India (EGI), the one filed by AMWJU has been stayed by the Supreme Court.
On the request of the army, the EGI sent a fact finding committee comprising Seema Guha, Sanjay Kapoor and Bharat Bhushan to Manipur to probe media reportage on the May 3, 2023 incident and the subsequent events.
After staying in Manipur for two/three days and talking with a few representatives of AMWJU, MHJU and EGM, the team went back and published a report charging the Imphal-based media as biased and they even termed the media based at Imphal as ‘Meitei media’.
Vehemently condemning the report, AMWJU and EGM sent a rebuttal along with a legal notice to the EGI to remove the defamatory sections of the fact finding committee’s report.
Instead of rectifying the report, the EGI uploaded both the rebuttal and legal notice of AMWJU and EGM on their website.
Subsequently, a criminal defamation case was filed at the Court of CJM, Imphal East.
The complaint filed by AMWJU president Bijoy Kakchingtabam said that the EGI, acting on a written request made by Army GOC’s General Staff (Information Warfare) Col Anurag Pandey on July 12, 2023, sent a team to Manipur.
The team stayed in Manipur from August 7, 2023 to August 10, 2023.
The EGI’s self proclaimed fact finding team went back and published a report titled “Media’s reportage on the ethnic violence in Manipur” on September 2, 2023 and the same report went viral on social media. The EGI’s report portrayed the Manipur media as incredible, biased and sectarian.
With the EGI refusing to remove the defamatory sections from their report, the complaint case sought appropriate legal action as per Sections 499 and 500 of IPC and appropriate order against the accused.          
Acting on the complaint, the CJM’s Court passed an order on June 25, 2024 directing the three members of the fact finding team and EGI president Seema Mustafa to come to the Court and file their response on July 15, 2024.
Challenging the CJM’s order, a writ petition was filed at the Supreme Court.
The apex Court stayed the CJM’s order and passed an order on September 6, 2024 asking the State of Manipur, Union of India and the AMWJU president to file their replies within three weeks.
The writ petition was filed by Seema Guha, Sanjay Kapoor, Bharat Bhushan and Seema Mustafa.
The respondents of the case are the State of Manipur (through Secretary, Department of Home), Union of India (through Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs and AMWJU president Bijoy Kakchingtabam.
Advocate Sapam Biswajit is representing the AMWJU president in the case.