On Wednesday, a division bench of Kerala High Court headed by Chief Justice S Manikumar and Justice Shaji P Chaly upheld an earlier single judge’s decision to ban Malayalam news channel MediaOne TV. The division bench stated that “Certain aspects relating to the security of the State are mentioned to the effect that Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited has some linkages with certain undesirable forces, which is stated to be a security threat.’’

Though the “ban” continues, the anti-national channel is still airing live on YouTube. Earlier, the Madhyamam Broadcasting Limited, owned by the radical Islamist organization Jamaat-e-Islami, which operates MediaOne TV and Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) had approached the High Court after a single bench refused to lift the ban on the channel. Various political outfits belonging to both Congress and the left have openly supported MediaOne and in view of the court verdict, many might find it hard to explain their earlier actions. 

MediaOne TV was banned by the Information & Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry after the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) refused to give clearance to the channel, citing “security reasons”. The division bench observed that as per the files produced by the central government, there are certain aspects affecting the security of the Bharat on the basis of the report of the Intelligence Bureau and other investigating agencies.

10-year old permission granted to MediaOne TV expired on September 29, 2021. How they got it in the first place is still a mystery but it was licensed in September 2011 and was officially launched on 10 February 2013 and is based out of Kozhikode. AK Antony while inaugurating the channel’s operations made it clear that he had pulled some strings in Delhi when he was the defense minister of Bharat. The Tamil Nadu lobby led by P Chidambaram and his son Karti Chidambaram was ‘handling’ affairs in the power corridors of Delhi back then. 

In May 2021, the company applied for renewal for 10 more years but the MHA denied its security clearance, and still, the channel continued its broadcast. On January 31, the ministry issued an order barring the channel’s transmission and within hours, the channel management moved the single bench of the high court, seeking relief.

The central government informed the court that based on the inputs from various intelligence agencies, the MHA had formed a committee of officers, which monitored the channel’s content and found that the security clearance for the channel should not be renewed. Along with the available online data several documents and other evidence were submitted to the court. Earlier, a single bench of N Nagaresh, after going through files submitted by the MHA, had observed that there were material and intelligence reports to support the ban on the channel.

Anti-Bharat Propaganda Tools

MediaOne TV has an unmatched history of anti-national reporting with an open agenda, to create deep fissures within Kerala society. They have continued to do so over the past many years with the latest attempts at polarization taking place after Article 370 was removed in Jammu & Kashmir. MediaOne was relentless in its coverage of Kashmiri militants to paint them as Martyrs (Shaheed), but more on that later.  

During the anti-CAA riots in 2020, MediaOne faced a 48-hour ban in connection with its reporting of the Delhi riots. Time and again, Hassanul Banna, MediaOne’s Delhi correspondent came on air to claim that Hindu protestors were targeting anti-CAA activists in Muslim-dominated areas like Jaffrabad, Maujpur, and Chand Bagh in Delhi and alleged that the Delhi police remained inactive. Their news telecast showed scenes of stone-pelting, arson, and injured being shifted to the hospital.

On live TV, they blatantly lied that many Mosques were on fire and that communal violence has cost many Muslims their lives. Such media propaganda has in the past led to riots but fortunately, that time around, Kerala remained unscathed. Other media channels too joined in the fray and chose the same false narrative. 

It was later proved that it was the other way around and that Islamist fanatics threw acid bombs and indulged in vicious use of weapons, stabbed IB officer Ankit Sharma 51 times that left his intestines all over the place. Several policemen were injured and head constable Rattan Lal lost his life after Islamist mobs stoned him and then shot him dead. To upset the functioning of our central government, Islamist foreign stooges from media houses like the Wall Street Journal too were drawn in.   

Back then, the MediaOne ban just did not happen since the Asianet News channel owned by Rajeev Chandrasekhar (a BJP MP in the Rajya Sabha) had also used the same narrative to spread fake news. Both MediaOne and Asianet were given the benefit of the doubt and were set scot-free. Such leniency by the central government emboldened the anti-nationals who then trained their guns on their real enemy, Bharat’s armed forces.

KUWJ has a history of backing anti-Bharat forces and is trying hard to get Popular Front of India (PFI) activists and ‘journalist’ Siddique Kappan released from jail. Kappan remains incarcerated in Tihar jail since October 2020 after Uttar Pradesh police arrested him for his role in the PFI attempt to flare up the Hathras gang-rape controversy. Kerala media and many national ones are employing Hindus In Name Only (HINO) shady characters who call themselves ‘journalists’ who in turn are clearly being handled by their Islamist masters belonging to the Jamaat-e-Islami.

The list of such fake journalists with a particular agenda is long and includes ones like Newslaundry and its reporter Akanksha Kumar, PR Sunil, and Prasanth Reghuvamsom from Asianet News, Mathrubhumi TV news anchor Venu Balakrishnan (he was later dismissed in a sexual harassment case) and rabid Islamists who masquerade as Communists like Hashmi Taj Ibrahim and as mentioned earlier, Banna and Kappan. They have tried their level best to paint a dark picture of Bharat and drive home the Islamist agenda that Bharat is not safe for Muslims. Mysteriously, all of them except Kappan are free to do the same, even today, in ‘unsafe’ fascist Bharat!

Azadi for Kashmir

Even as the central government was trying to resettle Kashmiri Pandits in the Kashmir valley, many innocent Hindus and Sikhs in Kashmir were killed by gun-toting terrorists from both Kashmir and Pakistan. It was the September-October period of 2021 and the central government had started issuing domicile certificates to Hindus. Terrorists have a history of allowing tourism to flourish at times but have been harsh on any Hindu who wishes to settle down and buy land in Kashmir.  

A pharmacist named Makhan Lal Bindroo, two poor laborers from Bihar Raja Rishidev and Yogendra Rishidev, two golgappa vendors named Virender Paswan, and Arvind Kumar Sah, again from Bihar, and an assortment of Muslims who were working for Hindus were all slaughtered in a matter of days. More importantly, Pakistani ISI was pushing even more terrorists into Kashmir. These incidents struck fear in the common Kashmiri pandit who had returned to Kashmir and Hindus were forced to migrate, again. 

The state had to act and the mission was entrusted to the army who started taking out not just the terrorists but also their supporters, from the equation. MediaOne was busy reporting ‘crimes’ against Kashmiri Muslims living in other parts of Bharat but remained passive about the terrorists executing Hindus in Kashmir. This was an old tool that MediaOne had perfected when Article 370 was removed where they used their propaganda to whitewash separatist Khalistani forces. 

Terrorists getting killed saddened our enemies who then triggered their local contacts, ie. media houses.  MediaOne sprung into action and rushed their ‘reporters’ to Kashmir. They interviewed the ‘martyrs’ families, the ones who were killed by the army. 

Special Kashmir Coverage

Army ‘atrocities’ against Muslims were explained in detail, terrorists and separatists were whitewashed as martyrs, and more importantly, they took out specific portions from the interview of an ex-military officer to allege that our army officers raped local Kashmiri women. All that the ex-military officer said during an interview was that a vicious crime should be confronted in a manner that would pre-empt further crimes. After all, how long will Hindus suffer in silence?

MediaOne directly quoted the likes of the Taliban, Mehbooba Mufti, and Recep Erdogan. By then the channel and its staff were so blinded by propaganda that they forgot that they were working out of Bharat.  

Overnight Kashmir became unsafe for Muslims, women, children, and the weak. MediaOne even took its propaganda to the UN. They told the international community that it is not a Pakistani, German, English, or American channel but an Indian one that was telecasting the atrocities! 

MediaOne is now merely exchanging HINO journalists from and to other TV channels. These journalists have collectively formed a union called the KUWJ. They are the same ones who continue to whitewash Kappan and Taliban atrocities. That means that their tirade continues and they spread propaganda that the Modi-led BJP government is illegally arresting journalists like Kappan and allowing the atrocious army to commit crimes unhindered. 

The latest example is Pramod Raman from Malayala Manorama and Smruthy Paruthikad from Mathrubhumi News TV. Both were molded by the leftist movements and have a history of anti-BJP as well as anti-Modi rants. MediaOne tried to play the secular card but these journalists joining them clearly shows their true face. In fact, Paruthikad joined this year when the whole news industry knew that MediaOne was about to be banned. 

For their anti-national activities, Jamaat-e-Islami was banned twice, once by Indira Gandhi in 1975 and later by Narasimha Rao in 1992. Incidentally, it was the Supreme Court of Bharat that brought them back, the second time around. This time too, MediaOne management and the KUWJ have promised to approach the Supreme Court.