TRIAL BY MEDIA: A PERSISTING TROUBLES OF 21ST CENTURY Advocate Ms Pinny Pathak LAW CRITIQUE Sat, May 18, 2019, at ,12:27 PM Media is regarded as the important and 4th pillar of democracy. Media has wide ranging roles in the society, importantly in moulding the opinion of the society and its capability of changing viewpoint through which people perceive various events. In a democratic set up there has to be active participation of people in all affairs of the state. It is their right to be kept informed about the current political social, economic and cultural life as well as the burning topics and important issues of the day in order to enable them to consider forming broad opinion in which they are being managed, tackled and administered by the government and their functionaries. To achieve this objective people need a clear and truthful account of events, so that they may form their own opinion and offer their viewpoints on matters and issues and select their future course of action. Here the role of Media comes in! However question arises- has the media transcended its role? Have they modified themselves drastically in order to adopt a different personality? In the grab of “right to impart of information” and “freedom of speech and expression” are they sensationalizing news for their own profits? The right to freedom of speech and expression in contained in Article 19 of the Constitution and this Article comes to the rescue of the Media. However this freedom is not absolute as it is bound by the sub clause (2) of the same Article. Importantly this freedom should not be used in such a way to commit contempt of court. One cannot deny the remarkable role of media has played in cases such as Priyadarshini Mattoo case, Jessica Lal case, Nitish Katara murder case. However they did overplay the acting of an “investigative journalist” by passing of judgment in the reporting of murder of Aarushi Talwar, when it pre-empted the court and reported that her own father Dr. Rajesh Talwar, and possibly her mother Nupur Talwar were involved in her murder. The concept of media trial is not a new concept. It has been debated since the cases of Priyadarshini Mattoo, Jessica Lal Murder and likewise many other high profile cases. There have been numerous instances in which media has been accused of conducting the trial of the accused and passing the ‘verdict’ even before the court passes its judgment. Here it is important to look into the definition of media and trial. Media is defined as communication channels through which news, entertainment, education, data, or promotional messages are disseminated. It includes every broadcasting and narrowcasting medium such as newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, billboards, direct mail, telephone, fax, and internet. Trial is essentially a process to be carried out by the courts. Trail can be defined as a formal examination of evidence by a judge, typically before a jury, in order to decide guilt in a case of criminal or civil proceedings. With a panel of experts giving their opinions on “what should be” and “what should not be” in a newsroom without examination of witnesses on oath, no application of laws and no chance given to the accused to state his reasons, verdict is passed by the media in one hour of debate of ‘guilty’ and ‘not guilty’. Thus the trial by media is definitely an undue interference in the process of justice delivery. One cannot deny that Media now acts as a ‘public court’. It has started to interfere in court proceedings, completely overlooking the vital gap between an accused and a convict keeping at stake the golden principles of ‘presumption of innocence until proven guilty’ and ‘guilt beyond reasonable doubt’. It builds a public opinion against the accused even before the court takes cognizance of the case. By this way, it prejudices the public and sometimes even judges and as a result the accused, that should be assumed innocent, is presumed as a criminal leaving all his rights and liberty unrepressed. If excessive publicity in the media about a suspect or an accused before trial prejudices a fair trial or results in characterizing him as a person who had indeed committed the crime, it amounts to undue interference with the “administration of justice”, calling for proceedings for contempt of court against the media. Trial by media is an utter disregard and a mockery of the media as well as of the judiciary. It is against the essential principle of any judicial system that the accused should receive a fair trial. It has also been observed in the case of State of Maharashtra v. Rajendra Jawanmal Gandhi by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, “A trial by press, electronic media or public agitation is very antithesis of the rule of law. It can well lead to miscarriage of justice”. With different news channels have cut-throat competition amongst themselves in regard to which channel comes up with the best-cooked stories grabbing the attention of the audience and raising their TRP. As a result, they land up delivering wrong information at the cost of making it sound interesting. The general public is affected by such media trial. In sensitive and high profile cases the protests and public outrage is certainly aggravated due to the information broadcasted by some of the news channels. Trial is very much effected by the Media sensation. Judges while making decision start considering Media criticism if they goes opposite from the view of the Media that’s why in mostly high profile cases verdict passes by media becomes the final verdict in trial courts. There is a vast difference in the role of media at the time of coverage of Jessica case and Arushi murder case. In the former case the media assisted the court and various other authorities in nabbing the culprit and bringing justice to the victim. They questioned the lackadaisical attitude of the witnesses and the law enforcement authorities. Whereas in the latter case that the media declared the person guilty before the court and law enforcement authorities could play their role. Opinions and viewpoints of the panellist were transformed and presented as verdict to the people at large. Thus the most suitable way to regulate the media will be to exercise the contempt jurisdiction of the court to punish those who violate the basic code of conduct. The use of contempt powers against the media channels and newspapers by courts have been approved by the Supreme Court in a number of cases. The media cannot be allowed freedom of speech and expression to an extent as to prejudice the trial itself.