Bombay High Court Tells Media To Follow Guidelines While Reporting Pune Woman's Death

Bombay High Court says Pune woman death coverage to be restrained: The Bombay High Court has now directed the media to practice restraint while reporting on the death of a woman from Pune. The media has been asked to refrain from publicising the death of the woman who had died after falling from her house on the first floor.

The division bench was of Justices SS Shinde and Manish Pitale issued the directive while hearing a petition filed by the woman's father. The petition was directed against news outlets who had allegedly sensationalised the case and claimed that the deceased was having an affair.

Senior counsel Shirish Gupte, who represented the woman's father, said that the petitioner had learnt about his daughter's death on February 8. She had fallen from the balcony of her flat in Pune and was pronounced dead at the hospital. Her death was followed by news reports which claimed that the 23-year-old woman was having an affair with a man. Gupte termed those reports as 'defamatory and derogatory.'

The counsel further said that about 12 audio clips of the woman's interaction with a man were being circulated by certain political parties and the media. He then went on to refer to a high court judgement which was passed in reference to Indian media's coverage of actor Sushant Singh Rajput's death.

The Bombay High Court bench then ordered the media to practice restraint. “By way of ad-interim relief, in the interregnum, we direct the respondents to scrupulously follow the guidelines issued by this Court." The news outlets were further instructed not to publish or give any unnecessary publicity to the incident.

The advocates who represented the media organisations assured that their clients won't publish anything objectionable regarding the death. Further hearing of the case has been scheduled for March 31.

Image Credit: The Indian Express