Supreme Court: The Bench comprising of CJ Dipak Misra and AM Khanwilkar and Dr DY Chandrachud JJ., refused to stay the Delhi High Court’s order restoring the ban on publication and sale of a book based on Baba Ramdev’s life i.e. “Godman to Tycoon”.
Ramdev in his suit had alleged that the information in the book was false, tended to injure his reputation. He further stated that the book contained defamatory and false information.
Juggernaut is the publisher of the mentioned book and it reached the Supreme Court in order to lift the ban on sale and publication of the book imposed.
Therefore, the Supreme Court in its order refused to lift the ban and asked the Delhi High Court to decide the petition by the end of September. The Court concluded by stating that keeping in view the contentions advanced with regard to the freedom of speech and expression and the rights of an author in writing a book, we only intend to clarify that the said observations should not influence the adjudicatory process while dealing with the matter finally.[Juggernaut Books Pvt. Ltd. v. Swami Ramdev, Special Leave to Appeal (C) No. 19050-19053 of 2018, order dated 23-07-2018]
