On 4 August 2017, the Delhi High Court came down strongly on Republic TV, asking them to respect Congress MP Shashi Tharoor’s “right to silence” in relation to the death of his wife Sunanda Pushkar.
The Court was hearing a fresh application by Tharoor, as part of his defamation suit against Arnab Goswami and his channel for reporting the death of his wife as a murder. Justice Manmohan issued a notice to Goswami and Republic TV over Tharoor’s allegation that they were continuing to defame and malign him, in contravention of assurances given by their lawyers at the previous hearing in the case.
The Court’s direction to respect the Kerala MP’s silence comes soon after videos emerged showing Republic TV’s journalist hounding Tharoor after a press conference a day earlier on 3 August 2017.
Republic Journalists Seen Harassing Tharoor on Video
Video footage uploaded by Pratik Sinha from Alt News, showed Republic TV journalists swarming around the Congress MP, demanding answers to their questions about the death of Sunanda Pushkar.
Four reporters from Republic TV with their camerapersons, as well as some camerapersons from other unidentified organisations, are seen following Tharoor out of the press conference and hounding him till he reached his car and drove off.
One reporter is heard asking Tharoor: “Why are you running, Mr Tharoor?” Another saying that “We will keep asking our questions. Why aren’t you answering our questions? Why are you trying to run away?”
A third voice can also be heard calling the Kerala MP a “coward” and a “killer”.
Given the less than cordial relations between Tharoor and Arnab Goswami’s channel, it is no surprise that Tharoor refrained from answering any of their questions.
Republic World Puts Out Partially True Footage
Curiously, Republic TV’s official Youtube channel does not currently include these clips. A video uploaded by Republic World channel shows repeated questions about Pushkar being put to Tharoor during his press conference at the launch of All India Professional Congress on 3 August.
The clip ends just before showing the reporters chasing after Tharoor as he leaves, which is surprising since Republic TV claims that its journalists were only asking tough questions.
The channel also decided to republish footage of its journalists being barred from entering an AICC press conference on 1 August, decrying the Congress’s refusal of entry to them as press censorship.
The former Union Minister condemned the harassment later on Twitter, noting the fact that he was called a ‘murderer’ again.
If it was in fact a journalist from Republic TV who called him a “murderer” or “killer”, this would clearly go against the assurances made by Republic’s lawyer Sandeep Sethi who had on 29 May said that they would refrain from calling Tharoor names.
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