Dharmasthala ‘mass burials’: Karnataka HC sets aside trial court’s gag order on media reports
Public’s right to know cannot be curtailed, especially in a case involving allegations of institutional failure and criminal wrongdoing, the court said.
The Karnataka High Court on Friday set aside a gag order issued by a Bengaluru civil court that had barred media outlets, YouTube channels and individuals from publishing reports or commentary related to allegations of mass graves, disappearances and crime against women and students over the past two decades in the temple town of Dharmasthala, the Hindustan Times reported.
Justice M Nagaprasanna observed that the public’s right to know cannot be curtailed, especially in a case involving allegations of serious institutional failure and possible criminal wrongdoing, India Today reported.
This came in response to a petition filed by the YouTube channel Kudla Rampage, which had challenged the civil court’s ex-parte injunction – an order passed without hearing the other side – on July 18.
The injunction, issued by the Additional City Civil and Sessions Court in Bengaluru, had been granted on a plea filed by Harshendra Kumar D, secretary of the Shri Dharmasthala Manjunatheshwara Education Society and brother of Bharatiya Janata Party MP D Veerendra Heggade. The Heggade family manages the Dharmasthala Manjunathaswamy Temple and the institutions affiliated with it.
The civil court order had directed the immediate deletion or de-indexing of 8,842 online links related to the mass grave allegations in Dharmasthala and also restrained the publication of any “defamatory content” against the Heggade family.
Quashing the order on Friday, the High Court said it was sending the case back to the lower court for fresh consideration.
In July, a first information report was registered in Dharamasthala based on a complaint by a sanitary worker, who alleged that he was forced to bury the bodies of several women bearing signs of sexual assault.
On July 19, the Karnataka government announced the formation of a Special Investigation Team to probe the case.
On Friday, Home Minister G Parameshwara reviewed the investigation and said the state was also monitoring social media posts about the case that could “wrongly impact society”, the Hindustan Times reported.
