No blanket ban on obscene pics: SC

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a plea to stop newspapers from publishing "obscene" photographs and articles, holding that imposing such a blanket ban will violate the right to freedom of speech and expression.

"An imposition of a blanket ban on the publication of certain photographs and news items etc. will lead to a situation where the newspaper will be publishing material which caters only to children and adolescents and the adults will be deprived of reading their share of their entertainment which can be permissible under the normal norms of decency in any society," said a bench of judges A R Lakshmanan and Tarun Chatterjee.

The bench said that any steps to impose a blanket ban on publishing of such photographs would also amount to prejudging the matter.

The petitioner, Ajay Goswami, an advocate, in his petition drew the court's attention to publication in the press, in particular in two leading newspapers of the capital, Times of India and Hindustan Times, of "obscene photographs, articles on pornography and sex education".

Dismissing the petition, the bench said, "Any steps to ban publishing of certain news pieces or pictures would fetter the independence of free press which is one of the hallmarks of our democratic set-up."

It noted that nudity per se could not be described as nudity.

The judges said that the two newspapers had stated that they had an internal regulatory system to ensure no objectionable photographs or matters got published.

The bench agreed with their submission that in order to shield minors and children the state should not forget that the same content might not be offensive to the sensibilities of adult men and women.

"The incidence of shielding the minors should not be that the adult population is restricted to read and see what is fit for children," it said.

The bench said the Press Council of India was empowered to deal with individual grievances.

The council had written to the central government to strengthen the Press Council law by vesting powers to deal with such publications, the bench pointed out, and asked the government to consider empowering the Council in this regard.