CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has asked police not to take any action on a criminal complaint against A R Murugadoss, director of Sarkar, starring Vijay, which sought to punish him for allegedly depicting the welfare schemes and freebies offered by Tamil Nadu government in poor light.
Justice N Anand Venkatesh gave the oral directive to this effect on Wednesday and adjourned the matter till December 14. Following a complaint from one G Devarajan, Central Crime Branch had registered an FIR against Murugadoss for alleged offences including promoting enmity between different groups.
In his petition seeking to quash the proceedings, the director submitted that no prima facie case is made out against him. In a free democracy, criticising the government policy is not an offence. In fact, it is a fundamental right guaranteed under Article 19(1) (a) of Constitution.
Apart from the reasonable restrictions imposed under article 19(2), right to freedom of expression, which are deemed to be projected as an objectionable wrong against a specific political party, will amount to a tyrannical rule, unjustifiable before the eyes of the law.
Moreover, the disputed scenes had already been removed by the Central Board of Film Certification. Therefore no offence, as claimed by complainant, was committed by the petitioner, he said.
State pulled up for not punishing adulterators
CHENNAI: The second bench of the Madras High Court has indicted the Food Safety authorities for not taking action against the adulterators of food items, particularly milk. Not satisfied with the status report submitted by the Food Safety department of the State government, the bench of Justices Vineet Kothari and Anita Sumanth, directed it to file a detailed report afresh, indicating the number of adulterators prosecuted and sent to jail and the number of pending cases.
Plea against school edu secretary closed
CHENNAI: Accepting submissions of Additional Advocate-General A Kumar, the Madras HC closed a contempt plea which sought to punish School Education secretary, director and others for allegedly violating court’s earlier orders. Kumar submitted that as per the court order, the department had settled all the dues to the family of a deceased teacher in Vallal SI Alagarsamy Chettiar HSS at Royapuram. Holding that there is no contempt or violation of the order of the court, Justice R Subbiah closed the application recently.
AC appointed to inspect city dog pounds
CHENNAI: A division bench of the Madras High Court has appointed Yogeshwaran as Advocate-Commissioner (AC) to inspect the dog pounds maintained by Greater Chennai Corporation and file report. Justices M Sathyanarayanan and P Rajamanickam gave the directive, when a PIL from Almighty Animal Care Trust, at Gerugambakkam, came up on Wednesday.
Plea for EC nod for starting party in Jaya’s name
CHENNAI: A writ plea has been made in the Madras High Court for a directive to the Election Commission in New Delhi to grant approval for starting a new political party in the name and style of ‘J Jayalalitha Party’, in short ‘JJ Party’. Justice Pushpa Sathyanarayana, before whom the petition from one P A Joseph came up for hearing on Wednesday, posted it after four weeks for hearing.
The petitioner had applied in March this year along with all necessary documents, for approval. However, the EC rejected his plea. Hence, the present petition.