HC lifts media gag on Delhi gang-rape trial coverage

The Delhi High Court today allowed media coverage of the day-to-day proceedings in the trial of five accused in the 16 December gang rape case.

Allowing the plea of a group of accredited journalists, the high court, set aside the order of the additional sessions judge heading the fast track-court looking into the case.

"The (trial) court will allow access to one representative journalist of each from the accredited national dailies," Justice Rajiv Shakdher of the Delhi high court ruled. However the media is still not allowed to disclose the identity of the victim or her family.

The judge said, "Reporters of (news agencies) PTI and UNI and other national dailies shall share their stories with the representatives of other newspapers and the electronic media."

The bench added, "The reporting shall not disclose the names of the victim or those of the members of the family of the victim or the complainant or witnesses cited in the proceedings."

Further, the judge said, "The reportage shall exclude the part of the proceedings which the trial court specifically so directs."

The high court also hoped that the media would confine its reporting to the news and would not transgress into the trial court's domain.

"There is a thin, but a clean and distinct line dividing the two which if respected will augur well for institutional integrity," the court observed.

The 23-year-old victim was viciously gang-raped in a moving bus in New Delhi by six perpetrators on the night of 16 December 2012; her male friend was also stripped naked and badly beaten with metal rods before both were dumped on the roadside.

The lady died of her injuries 13 days later. In the meantime, national anger against such incidents reached unprecedented proportions, finally forcing the government's hand in passing the anti-rape bill on Thursday (See: RS passes sex crimes bill; consent age remains at 18).