The Madras High Court has ordered Sun TV Network to pay ₹10 lakh in damages to actor R. Sukanya over the telecast of journalist Nakheeran R. Gopal’s 1996 interview with forest brigand Veerappan, holding that the channel failed to remove defamatory allegations made against her before airing the program. Justice K. Kumaresh Babu dismissed Sun TV Network’s appeal against a Chennai city civil court decree that had already awarded the actor compensation.
The court said the television channel should have verified the contents of the interview before broadcasting it and found that malice had been established. According to the judgment, Sun TV had been given the right to edit, cut, delete, modify or alter portions of the interview, but did not use that discretion responsibly. The judge noted that the network aired only four hours of footage from nine hours of recordings over eight days, with each episode running for about 30 minutes.
R. Sukanya had first filed a civil suit in the Madras High Court in 1996 seeking ₹10 lakh in damages from the television network, Gopal and Veerappan, after scandalous allegations were made against her during the interview. The case was later transferred to the city civil court in Chennai in 2011 because of pecuniary jurisdiction. During the trial, Sun TV argued that it had no intention to defame anyone and that it was Gopal who had approached the channel to telecast the interview.
Gopal, however, told the court that under the telecast agreement, Sun TV had the authority to edit any part of the interview. The city civil court accepted Sukanya’s claim and, on April 15, 2015, directed the network to pay her ₹10 lakh in damages. The High Court has now upheld that decision.
Justice Babu also referred to the channel’s response after receiving a legal notice from Sukanya. The court observed that Sun TV expressed regret in a Tamil magazine rather than on the channel that had aired the interview, and said this conduct supported a finding of malice. The judgment emphasized that the network had not taken diligent steps to check the interview’s contents despite having full editorial control.
Sukanya, known for her role opposite Kamal Haasan’s Senapathy in the 1996 film Indian, had sought legal redress nearly three decades ago after the broadcast reportedly harmed her reputation. With the latest ruling, the High Court has brought the long-running defamation dispute to a close by affirming the compensation award in her favour.
