Zee Media issues legal notice to Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu for defamatory, false allegations

A week after the Congress and its senior party leader Navjot Singh Sidhu accused Zee News of doctoring a video, the media organisation issued a legal notice to him for his defamatory and false allegations against Zee Media Corporation Limited (ZMCL) and its editor-in-chief Sudhir Chaudhary. 

Zee News had promptly shut the Congress when they alleged that the video, which showed 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans being raised at an election rally addressed by Sidhu, was a fake one. After Zee News brought to light the video, the Congress leaders remained defiant and instead accused Zee News of playing a 'fake video'.

.@ZeeNews issues ₹1000 crore defamation notice to Navjot Sidhu for his defamatory and false allegations against Zee Media. If he doesn’t apologise we shall use all legal recourses to take this case to its logical conclusion. pic.twitter.com/MUSqjNJuYJ — Sudhir Chaudhary (@sudhirchaudhary) December 15, 2018

ZMCL on December 10 issued a Rs 1,000 crore defamation notice to Sidhu for his defamatory allegations against Zee Media. The organisation asked him to apologise within 24 hours of receiving the legal notice, failing which ZMCL will use 'all legal recourses to take this case to its logical conclusion'.

Earlier, a video had shown 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans being raised at an election rally addressed by Sidhu.

After the stand taken by Zee News amidst the accusations by Congress, Sudhir Chaudhary made a live video on social media platform Facebook and reiterated that the stand taken by the media organisation is influenced by truth and truth alone. The video has garnered the support of thousands of people on the social media platform.

The post has had 3.2 million hits till Tuesday 10 pm, shared at least 55,884 times and 91,000 likes. After Chaudhary shared the video on Twitter, the post was retweeted by at least 1K people and liked by 2.8K people.

Earlier too, standing tall amid the allegations, Chaudhary had said, "I outright deny the allegation that the video is fake. It is 100 per cent authentic. To prove this, we have at least seven other feeds that were being recorded live and every feed has the same slogan at the same time. It has become fashionable now that when a leader of Congress is caught red-handed, the party comes to his defence by terming the video to be a fake. This is nothing but yet another Congress tactic to get out of the situation. Zee News completely stands by its video."

But Congress leaders were defiant and accused Zee News of playing a doctored video. Sidhu even threatened to file a defamation case against Zee News. Congress supporters launched a campaign against Zee News on social media which was also supported by a few media houses and journalists. Congress leaders went as far as possible to tweet suitably edited videos that omitted the part where the slogans were raised.