The Kerala High Court on Tuesday (Feb 8) upheld the decision of the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting to revoke the licence of Malayalam news channel MediaOne.

Justice N Nagaresh dismissed the plea of Madhyamam Broadcasting Ltd -- which operates MediaOne -- challenging the central government's January 31 decision.

The court said that the decision of the Ministry of Home Affairs to deny security clearance was based on the intelligence inputs received from various agencies.

“Based on the inputs from various intelligence agencies, the MHA had formed a committee of officers, which found that the security clearance for the channel should not be renewed. The MHA also considered the entire facts and decided to accept the recommendations of the committee of officers. I find that there are inputs which justify the decision of the MHA. Therefore, I propose to dismiss the petition,” the judge said.

The Centre, during the arguments on Monday, had contended that a security clearance once issued cannot continue forever.

The central government had previously told the court that the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) denied security clearance to MediaOne over national security concerns based on intelligence inputs.

The channel, on the other hand, contended that MHA clearance was only required at the time for fresh permission/license and not at the time of renewal.

The channel, which is controlled by Jamaat-e-Islami, went off-air on Monday (Jan 31) noon.

MediaOne TV had previously that it had applied for broadcast permissions to be renewed from September 30, 2021 to September 29, 2031.

It had also contended that, according to the uplinking and downlinking guidelines, security clearance was only required at the time of application for fresh permission and not at the time of renewal of licence.

This was not the first time the channel has faced such a bar on its operation.

In March 2020, the ministry had prohibited the transmission or re-transmission of the channel for 48 hours, along with Asianet News TV, charging it with maliciously motivated and biased reporting of North East Delhi riots. The ministry had said that it acted against the channel for violating provisions of the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1998.

(With Inputs From PTI)

Also read: MediaOne, A Kerala Based TV Channel Operated By Islamist Outfit Jamaat-e-Islami, Barred From Transmission By Union Government On National Security Grounds