[BREAKING] MediaOne Ban: Supreme Court seeks response from Central govt; directs production of material relied on by Govt.

The Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to the Central government on the appeal filed by Malayalam news channel Media One challenging the Central government's decision to revoke the broadcasting license of the channel on the ground of national security [Madhyamam Broadcasting Ltd. v Union of India]..A Bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, Surya Kant and Vikram Nath ordered the Central government to place before the Court all relevant material relied upon by the government and listed the case for hearing on March 15. The Court also issued notice on plea for interim relief."Issue Notice on both SLP and Interim Relief. Returnable on March 15. 2022. Liberty to serve the central agency. Respondents shall produce all the relevant files on reliance has been placed by the court on next date of listing," the Court said."We saw the order, they say too many details are not available," said Justice Chandrachud remarked.Senior Counsel Mukul Rohatgi, Dushyant Dave and Huzefa Ahmadi and advocate Haris Beeran appeared for MediaOne..The appeal by MediaOne has challenged Kerala High Court Division Bench judgment which had upheld the Central government's ban.A Division Bench of Chief Justice S Manikumar and Justice Shaji P Chaly had upheld a single-judge decision which had rejected the channel's plea against government decision to revoke its license.On February 8, single-judge Justice N Nagaresh had upheld the decision of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B Ministry) to revoke the Malayalam channel's licence. The Court opined that the material handed over to the Court in a sealed cover indicated that the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had sufficient cause to deny security clearance to the channel, thereby justifying the ban.The appeal against said order before the Division Bench alleged that the Central government's haste to cancel the licence of the channel indicated that there was some pre-scripted agenda motivated by some ill-will against the channel.The channel which is owned by Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited was issued a notice by the ministry on January 5, 2022 in which it was stated that in consideration of national security and public order, the government can revoke licences. It also asked them to show cause as to why their licence should not be revoked as the company had not received security clearance from the Ministry of Home Affairs.The Central government had told the High Court that the decision to revoke the licence was based on credible national security concerns.However, they refused to state what the concerns raised by MHA were, and contended that a party cannot insist on observing natural justice principles in a situation involving national security.The Centre also submitted a sealed cover some information regarding the reasons which contributed to the decision to deny security clearance.The High Court had accepted the same to uphold the ban. This is not the first time a channel has faced such a ban. In 2020, MediaOne along with another Malayalam channel, Asianet, were suspended for 48 hours over their coverage of the Delhi Riots, with official orders saying the channels had covered it in a manner which "highlighted the attack on places of worship and siding towards a particular community"Recently, another media services company, MediaGuru, moved the Delhi High Court challenging the show-cause served on it by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.[Read Order]