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Journalist Arnab Goswami and his news channel Republic TV told the Delhi High Court on Friday that they have neither “condemned” Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, nor suggested that he was involved in the death of his wife Sunanda Pushkar.
In their affidavits filed before Justice Manmohan, Goswami and the channel have denied that Tharoor was called “the killer” of his wife by him or the channel, as alleged by the Congress MP.
They were responding to the notice issued to them by the court on Tharoor’s Rs two crore civil defamation suit filed against them for allegedly making defamatory remarks against him on the issue of the mysterious death of Pushkar.
The high court had on 4 August had asked Goswami and Republic TV to respect Tharoor's “right to silence,” but did not give an order on the Congress MP's plea to restrain the news network from alleged misreporting on his wife's death.
Congress leader Shashi Tharoor had on 3 August filed an application before the Delhi High Court seeking to restrain Republic TV from making defamatory publications against him with regard to the death of his wife Sunanda Pushkar.
Earlier, Tharoor hit out on Republic TV’s journalists on Twitter and said that “their harassment was puerile”.
Other Congress leaders also posted videos of the incident that Tharoor was referring to.
On 29 May, the high court had said the TV news channel can air stories by stating the facts related to the investigation into the death of Pushkar, but cannot call the Lok Sabha MP from Thiruvananthapuram a “criminal”.
The court said that they (Goswami and his channel) cannot use such language and had sought response from the journalist and channel on the defamation suit by 16 August.
The application stated: "Numerous shows, debates, interviews etc are being broadcast repeatedly on the News Channel of the defendants, wherein innuendos are being used to portray that the plaintiff was complicit in the unfortunate death of the deceased."
"There have also been instances when the plaintiff has been categorically called to be the killer of the deceased," it added.
The Congress leader pleaded that the expression "murder of Sunanda Pushkar" should not be used as it is yet to be established by a competent court of law that the death of his wife was a 'murder'.
The court will hear Tharoor's application on Friday.
Tharoor, in his defamation suit, said he has suffered humiliation and severe loss of reputation in the eyes of the public.
He has baselessly been declared by them as the alleged murderer of his wife, said the defamation suit seeking a permanent injunction against the channel from reporting or broadcasting any news regarding Pushkar's death until investigations are complete.
(With PTI and IANS inputs.)
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