38 film bodies and production houses have filed a suit against a news channel and four journalists for defaming the Hindi film industry. Over the last couple of months, Bollywood became target of constant ridicule on news channels with derogatory terms being used for the industry. Republic TV, Arnab Goswami, Pradeep Bhandari, Times Now, Rahul Shivshankar, Navika Kumar have been named in the suit filed before the Delhi High Court. Production houses of Shah Rukh Khan, Ajay Devgn, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Karan Johar, Akshay Kumar, Aditya Chopra, Farhan Akhtar, Zoya Akhtar and all other major banners have all come together as plaintiffs in the suit. The Film &Television Producers Guild of India (PGI) and Cine & TV Artistes Association (CINTAA) have also joined the suit.
Reportedly, the suit asks the news channels to “take down all the DEFAMATORY content published by them against Bollywood.” To note, the news channels are accused of using highly derogatory words such as “dirt”, “filth”, “scum”, “druggies” & expressions such as "all the perfumes of Arabia cannot take away the stench and the stink of this filth and scum of the underbelly of Bollywood”. The suit also mentioned, “On several occasions, some of the Defendants have been PENALIZED and REPRIMANDED & have had orders passed against them by Courts for irresponsible reportage and defamatory content & have been found guilty of broadcasting incorrect news.” Republic TV is also embroiled in a fake TRPs controversy. Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh had claimed that Republic TV and two other Marathi channels had manipulated TRPs.The TRP racket was unearthed after a police complaint by Hansa Research Group Pvt Ltd, the agency contracted by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to place audience meters to monitor TV channels watched by households.