Four journalists move Madras High Court to forbear SIT from harassing them

Four journalists have filed writ petitions in the Madras High Court to forbear an all-women Special Investigation Team (SIT), which is probing the Anna University sexual assault FIR leak case, from harassing them on the pretext of inquiry and also to return the mobile phone seized from one of them.

While V. Ramkumar from Jaya TV, R. Samuel Ebenezer from News 7 Tamil, and D. Srikkanth of DT Next had filed a joint writ petition, M. Saravana Kumar of Polimer TV filed a separate petition. All the petitions have been listed for hearing before Justice G.K. Ilanthiraiyan on Tuesday (February 4, 2025).

Filing an affidavit in support of the joint writ petition, Mr. Ramkumar said Mr. Srikkanth was able to download the FIR from the e-services website only because the police had miserably failed to get it blocked to prevent the identity of the sexual assault victim being made public.

Though the third petitioner had downloaded the FIR, he had not revealed the identity of the victim. Yet, the SIT had summoned him for an inquiry and seized his iPhone on January 28, the petitioners complained, and sought a direction to return the mobile phone to him forthwith.