A court in Jammu and Kashmir has ordered the registration of an FIR against Zee News and News18 India for allegedly broadcasting false and defamatory content during Operation Sindoor.
According to Bar and Bench, a Poonch court passed the order on June 28 based on a complaint filed by an advocate named Sheikh Mohammad Saleem. Saleem had said both channels had falsely identified a local teacher killed in Pakistani shelling as a “terrorist”.
The police had reportedly argued in court that since the content was broadcast from Delhi, the matter was outside the court’s territorial jurisdiction. But the court rejected this objection and flagged “serious journalistic misconduct” in labelling the teacher as a terrorist “without any verification”.
As reported by The Wire, the court ordered the FIR be registered against “certain news anchors and editorial personnel of national television media houses namely Zee News, News18 and others”. It said the reportage amounted to defamation, public mischief and outraging religious sentiments, all of which are punishable under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and Section 66 of the Information Technology Act.
The teacher in question was Qari Mohammad Iqbal, a 47-year-old resident of Poonch who was killed on May 7. Newslaundry reported on how CNN-News18 called Iqbal a “terrorist” whom India “was searching for a very long time”. The channel also claimed he had masterminded the Pulwama attack. Its Hindi counterpart News18 India called him a “Lashkar commander” who ran “terror factories” in PoK.
Zee News called Iqbal “NIA’s most wanted” terrorist who “brainwashed youths and prepared them for terror activities”. Republic called him a “top LeT commander”.
The Poonch police subsequently tweeted that Iqbal “had no terror links”, and that “legal action will follow against those spreading information”.
Poonch Police refutes fake news circulating about the death of Maulana Mohd Iqbal in cross-border shelling. He had no terror links. Misreporting causes panic and Legal action will follow against those spreading misinformation. @JmuKmrPolice @ZPHQJammu @digrprange
— DISTRICT POLICE POONCH (@Poonch_Police) May 8, 2025
Newslaundry met Iqbal’s family in Poonch days after his death. His family said: “We kept trying to console ourselves by saying that he has been martyred for the country, that he is closer to Allah now. But what we did not see coming was the wrath of the Indian media. That really broke us.”
Read the full report here.
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