The broadcast of Malayalam news channel MediaOne was stopped by the central government on Monday on “security grounds.” A single-judge panel of the Kerala High Court then delayed the order for two days.
Background
In response to a petition filed by MediaOne TV, Justice N. Nagaresh stayed the Ministry of Information and Broadcast implementation until the next hearing on Wednesday. He also asked Additional Solicitor General S Manu to seek instructions from the Union ministry on the matter.
Malayalam channels have been in hot water with the government before. MediaOne TV, a Malayalam news station, was taken off the air by the Information and Broadcasting ministry. However, it was reinstated by the Kerala high court a few hours later. Officials in the ministry said the station was shut down because of concerns that the information it broadcast breached national security.
The situation
The government’s request to postpone the hearing till Wednesday was granted by the judge assigned to the case. The judge was Justice N. Nagaresh. The Center was served with a formal notice from the court. A notification was also sent to Planetcast Media Services, which supplies the station with broadcasting services.
Earlier this year, MediaOne TV requested an extension of its broadcast license until September 29, 2031. In a statement, editor Pramod Raman said that the I&B ministry has banned the station from airing new episodes. He stated that security grounds for the suspension have been cited by the government. However, the channel has yet to receive any more information. MediaOne TV has not been given any information on the ban by the Union Government.
A tweet from MK Muneer, a member of the Indian Union Muslim League, said that the ban was an attempt to “silence critical voices.” In 2020, the I&B ministry claimed that the station had breached the rules of the Cable Television Networks Rules. This happened due to the station’s reporting of violence in Delhi as a result of demonstrations against the Citizenship Amendment Act.
The channel was therefore shut down. Insiders in the Delhi administration say that the riots were sparked by the channel, which blamed the RSS and the Delhi Police.
Incidents of the past
This isn’t the first time MediaOne has been chastised by the Center. The government has issued a notice to Madhyamam Broadcasting, which owns the TV station.
After the Ministry of Home Affairs revoked its security clearance on national security grounds, it asked the channel management why it should not be revoked. An explanation of the channel’s operations that were deemed dangerous to national security was omitted from the ruling.
The station’s license was renewed in 2019 after the channel wrote to the government indicating that it had never behaved against national security. During this time, the channel was permitted to continue broadcasting.
In 2020, the station, along with Asianet News, was again blocked for 48 hours due to its coverage of the Delhi riots. The government had chosen to prohibit the two networks because of their “biased” coverage of the Delhi riots.
According to instructions dated March 6, 2020, Asianet News and MediaOne TV broadcast a story on February 25, 2020, that was “biased” against a certain population.
Conclusion
After the 2020 directive, the ministry did not renew MediaOne’s license, as it had done in 2019. Instead of issuing a license renewal, the ministry issued an order requesting that the firm cease operations on January 31st, 2022.
As soon as the Delhi riots ended in March 2020, MediaOne was briefly banned from broadcasting because of its critical stance against the Delhi police and RSS. The administration was forced to remove the embargo after receiving a barrage of criticism.
