New Delhi: A day-long ban on news channel NDTV that was met with wide protests from the media has been put on hold after the Supreme Court of India (SCI) announced that it would hear an appeal on Tuesday. However, after the the government put the ban on hold the SCI on Tuesday refrained from hearing NDTV’s petition and deferred the hearing to December 5.
Earlier this week, the Indian government ordered the NDTV news channel to be taken off air for a day as a penalty for its coverage of Pathankot attack in January. Officials had said the channel would go off air on Wednesday (Nov. 09).
The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting maintained that the NDTV Hindi revealed strategically sensitive details during the Pathankot attack.
NDTV rejected the accusations, saying its coverage was “particularly balanced”, and it had been “singled out since every channel and newspaper had similar coverage”.
The Editors’ Guild of India and opposition politicians condemned the ban, saying it was an infringement on press freedom and demanded the decision be reversed immediately.
One newspaper, the Kashmir Reader, has been banned for more than a month with officials maintaining its contents could incite violence.