‘Sex CD’: Jarkiholi gets injunction against media; 6 more ministers move court

Six Karnataka ministers have moved a Bangaluru court seeking to restrain media organisations from publishing or airing any “defamatory or unauthenticated” material against them. The move by the ministers came after their former colleague, Ramesh Jarkiholi, was forced to resign after a video of him in compromising positions with a woman went viral.

Interestingly, on Friday, a civil and sessions court in Bengaluru restrained the media from showing contents of the alleged 'sex CD' featuring Jarkiholi.

The six ministers of Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa’s government who moved court on Friday are Labour Minister Shivaram Hebbar, Agriculture Minister B.C. Patil, Cooperative Minister S.T. Somashekar, Health, Family Welfare and Medical Education Minister K. Sudhakar, Youth Empowerment and Sports Minister K.C. Narayana Gowda and Urban Development Minister Byrathi Basavaraj.

After hearing their joint plea, the additional city civil sessions judge reserved his order, which is expected to be delivered on Saturday. The six ministers are among the 17 MLAs who had rebelled against the Congress-JD(S) coalition government, leading to its fall in July 2019 and paving way for the BJP to come to power. Disqualified from their respective parties—Congress and JD(S)—the MLAs had subsequently joined the BJP, contested bypolls in December 2019 on BJP tickets and were made ministers after winning the polls.

Ramesh Jarkiholi, who recently resigned as a minister amid allegations of sexual harassment after the emergence of the sex CD, had also defected to the BJP and had become a minister. Confirming the ministers’ step of approaching the court, Family Welfare and Medical Education Minister K. Sudhakar, in a series of tweets, said the ministers moved court amid apprehensions of a political conspiracy being hatched to defame some “honestly working” ministers.

Breather for Jarkiholi

Jarkiholi's petition to the court, filed on Wednesday, had named 68 respondents, including media houses and channels. On Friday, the court at Mayo Hall ordered that the respondents "are hereby restrained by an order of an exparte ad¬ interim injunction from telecasting or publishing or broadcasting or distribution in any form or manner of the contents of the alleged C.D. or any other material, negatively, referring to the Plaintiff leading to defamatory act, his dignity assassination or creating sarcastic views about him in any manner including showing the footages and pictures involving negative spectrum, till the next date of hearing". The court is expected to take up the matter on March 18.

The court added the order did not restrain media from “publishing the authenticated and true news, after due verification, without making any defamatory remarks against the Plaintiff”.