The Madras High Court on Monday framed the issues to be decided in a civil suit filed by Chief Minister M.K. Stalin in 2019 demanding damages of ₹1.1 crore from Ananda Vikatan publications for having reported that lottery baron Martin Santiago donated ₹500 crore to the DMK towards election funds.
Justice C.V. Karthikeyan agreed with advocate Richardson Wilson, representing Mr. Stalin, that the recent data regarding electoral bonds could not be taken into account at the time of framing of issues and circumstances which prevailed at the time of the filing of the suit in 2019 alone would be relevant.
Mr. Wilson said, the issues could be framed only on the basis of averments made in the plaint filed by his client and the written statement filed by the defendants. He said, the written statement filed in 2023 did not contain any reference to electoral bonds and therefore it could not be taken into consideration.
“The bone of contention is only one article published in the print edition of Junior Vikatan magazine on May 8, 2019 and also in their online portal. The question is whether the defendants had verified the facts and whether they had followed basic journalistic norms before publishing this article,” the counsel said.
He also said, “In the written statement filed by one of the defendants and adopted by all others, they have not denied the publication of the article as such. They have only harped on issues such as the freedom of press and have also contended that personalities in public life must be open to criticism.”
After hearing him, the judge said, the issues to be decided in the suit would be as to whether the defendants had verified the facts before publishing the article, whether they were entitled to seek protection under the Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution and whether the article could be classified to be of public interest.
Whether the defendants, other than the Editor, could be made answerable to the claim of the plaintiff and whether the suit would be hit by misjoinder of parties were the other issues framed by the judge who directed the High Court Registry to list the case before the Master court for recording of evidence on June 12.
