NEW DELHI: Supreme Court Thursday ordered police in Delhi, Karnataka, Telangana, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Haryana to provide protection to offices and officials of Discovery Communications which claimed threats to life and property since telecast of documentary ‘Cult of Fear: Asaram Bapu, Saint or Sinner?’ from the self-styled religious guru’s supporters.
Senior advocate Abhinav Mukerji told a bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna, and Justices Sanjay Kumar and K V Viswanathan that supporters of the jailed self-styled godman, convicted of murder charges, had attempted to vandalise Discovery’s Mumbai office after telecast of the documentary on Jan 30 on its OTT platform and a complaint was lodged at Bandra Kurla Complex PS seeking protection.
Mukerji said though police dispersed the mob, it failed to take any concrete action against the hooligans. Thereafter, threats were issued to Discovery officials. The bench issued notice to the state govts and ordered that adequate security measures be taken at the offices of Discovery. “The petitioners, their colleagues working at and associated with Discovery, its subsidiaries and parent entities are facing grave threats, criminal intimidation, physical violence to their life, limbs and properties in the form of hate crime from the supporters of Asumal Sirumalani Harpalani, popularly known by his devotees as “Asaram Bapu”, an Indian spiritual leader who is presently serving a life sentence for heinous crimes, including rape and murder since 2018,” Discovery said.
The documentary was released for telecast after “finding the same completely unbiased, fair and balanced in its narration of the real story surrounding the life of Asaram Bapu especially in the context of various criminal charges against him and his son resulting to their conviction,” Discovery said, adding it has taken due care to maintain neutrality and base its narration of events to court documents and investigation reports.
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