Ethics and Freedom

On Thursday, the Supreme Court finally took a stand on the contentious and controversial issue of television sting operations. The judges asked for an unconditional apology from a Zee News reporter who had conducted a sting operation seeking to reveal corruption in the lower judiciary. Asked the Chief Justice of India, “What public good has the reporter done? Prime facie, he has committed a...

NEW DELHI: The Rajasthan police, which bore the brunt of the violent Gujjar agitation to press for ST status in May this year, has said that the unrestrained coverage of the unfortunate incidents by local and national electronic media fanned the violence. Director-general of police A S Gill, in his affidavit before the Supreme Court, did a comparison of the behaviour of the domestic media with its...

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday pulled up Vijay Shekhar, journalist of a television channel for conducting the “cash for warrant” sting operation, in which an Ahmedabad magistrate issued warrants against the then President, the then Chief Justice of India and two others. Mr. Shekhar paid Rs. 40,000 to three Ahmedabad-based advocates, who, on the basis of a fictitious complaint, obtained...

Reporters Without Borders condemned judicial harassment of the Arabic-language daily “Al Watan Al An” on 24 July 2007, after the Casablanca prosecutor’s office released its editor, Abderrahim Ariri, but sent one of his reporters, Mostapha Hurmatallah, to Okacha prison pending trial. Arrested on 17 July after publishing a leaked internal security memo, both have been charged with “receiving...

The Senate Commerce Committee has passed a strict bill that would allow the FCC to penalize and/or fine a radio or television station for a single word or image found to violate the agency's indecency regulations. The bill, titled the "Protecting Children from Indecent Programming Act," was introduced by Democratic Senators John D. Rockefeller and Mark Pryor, and was cosponsored by Committee...

NEW YORK: Two journalists working for a British tabloid newspaper were arrested Tuesday after trying to plant a fake bomb on a train, the newspaper said. The Daily Mirror said the men were caught by railway staff at the Stonebridge Park depot on the London Underground's Bakerloo line. The staff called police, and the men were arrested. The newspaper said the men were engaged in a "legitimate and...

The present crisis for the BBC is far worse that at the time of the Hutton Report. Then it was widely believed that the report came down too harshly on the BBC for a minor editorial indiscretion – a live broadcast loosely phrased – in response to complaints made by the government's press officer, revealed in his recent diaries to be an explosively unstable and erratic personality. The BBC, which...

Has the debate about trust in the British media ever had so much resonance? Last week's revelations about deceptions in broadcasting only contributed to a debate that has been simmering for some time, and which encompasses all media – including new media as well as television and print. Yet, in terms of the press, there are some reasons to be positive about what can be done to maintain and enhance...

RSF condemns the 20 July 2007 seizure order by Judge Juan del Olmo of an issue of the satirical weekly magazine "El Jueves". The issue carries a cartoon on the cover of Crown Prince Felipe and his wife Letizia having sex. The judge said the cartoon may have violated Article 490.3 of the Criminal Code, which punishes "insults" to the royal family by up to two years imprisonment, and also Article...

British news websites should display a kitemark to indicate they adhere to Press Complaints Commission (PCC) guidelines, the head of journalism's self-regulatory agency has said. PCC director Tim Toulmin said that the current debate over trust in broadcasting, sparked by the premium phone-in scandal, necessitated a multimedia standard to restore faith. "It will not be enough to subscribe to a...