JUDGMENT
Manmohan Sarin, J.
1. Rule.
With the consent of the parties, writ
petition is taken up for disposal.
2. The petitioner in response to an
advertisement of respondent No. 2 i.e. Directorate
General, Doordarshan, inviting proposals, under the new
sponsorship scheme in September, 1990, gave his
proposal for telecasting a serial. Petitioner offered
to telecast his serial ‘Jhumru or Saat Thug” under the
categories of children serials. Certain discrepancies
were pointed out to the petitioner by respondent No. 2.
Petitioner claims to have removed the same.
3. In the year 1992, the petitioner’s
serial was listed at item No. 7 in the wait list for the
prime slot. Subsequently, the respondents informed the
petitioner that there has been a change and
prioritisation of serials would be done by random
number generation through a computer. Based on the
‘random generation’ petitioner’s serial was waitlisted
at priority No. 21. The petitioner waited in vain to
hear from the respondent, but to no avail. The
respondent thereafter enquired of the petitioner
whether he would be willing to accept the non-prime
slot, as there was no scope for telecasting the
waitlisted proposals for a few years on the prime time
slots. Petitioner indicated his willingness to have
his serials on the non-prime time slot. The respondent
thereafter informed the petitioner that his serial had
been waitlisted under the New Sponsorship Scheme
Along with the other waitlisted serials.
4. Thereafter, on 29th September, 1997,
respondent asked the petitioner to produce a pilot of
the programme at his own cost and risk and to submit
the same to the respondent within a period of three
months for consideration by the Selection
Committee/Preview Committee. On 28th December, 1997,
the petitioner submitted the pilot programme to the
respondent. The petitioner kept on reminding the
respondents for telecasting of his serial, but there
was no response. Ultimately, on 22nd June, 2000, the
respondents informed the petitioner that the pilot
programme of the petitioner’s serial has not approved
for telecasting on DD-1. The petitioner thereafter
filed the present writ petition seeking a writ of
mandamus to allot a prime time slot to the petitioner
for telecasting serial ‘Jhumru or Saat Thag’.
Petitioner also sought compensation for the losses
suffered.
5. Petitioner has filed an additional
affidavit to bring on record certain developments which
were not mentioned in the writ petition. The
petitioner who was disgusted with the non-telecasting
of his serial on DD-1 requested the respondent to
consider the same for telecasting on DD-2 Metro
Channel. The respondents in response to the
petitioner’s request for telecasting his serial at
DD-2, informed him that it has been slated for
telecasting from 12th July, 1998 for 26 episodes. The
petitioner sought extension of time, vide his letter
dated 6th July, 1998 for telecasting the same.
Petitioner again applied for extending the date of
telecasting on 4th August, 1998. The respondents
thereupon, on 29th October, 1998 finally informed the
petitioner to resume the telecast immediately or else
the slot would be withdrawn.
6. Mr. Vashisht, learned counsel for the
petitioner assails the actions of the respondents as
arbitrary and discriminatory. He submits that the
petitioner after the successful preparation of the
script of the serial was left in uncertainty for a
long period. As regards the final rejection of the
serial for telecasting on DD-1 by the Preview
Committee, Mr. Vashisht submit that once the petitioner
had been asked to prepare a pilot for the serial, the
scope of the Preview Committee was confined to
suggesting some modifications or improvements and it
could not reject the same.
I am afraid similar plea has been rejected
by this Bench in Urvashi Films & TV Group v. Union of
India and Ors. (C.W. No. 5674/2000) decided on 28th
September, 2000. In the cited case, it was held that
the Preview Committee while considering the pilot of a
programme is to decide its acceptability for telecast
finally. Its function was not confined to merely
suggesting additions or alterations. The latter was
only a supplementary function. An LPA against the said
decision was filed, but he same has been dismissed by
the Division Bench. This submission, accordingly, will
not advance petitioner’s case.
7. Coming to the second plank of the
petitioner’s submission, Mr. Vashisht very strenuously
urged that there was arbitrariness in the decision
making process of the respondents in as much as the
Committee headed by the same Convener Ms. Usha Bhasin,
Controller of Programme had approved the said serial
for telecasting on DD-2, while rejecting the same for
DD-1. The submission appears attractive on the first
flush. However, a deeper consideration would show that
the criteria, requirements of content and the standards
of serials for acceptability for the two channels may
be different. The respondents in the counter-affidavit
and the additional affidavit have set out that even
though the Committee may have been headed by the same
person, the composition of the Committee was different.
Secondly, it is argued that DD-1 is a national channel
where the acceptability criteria, requirement of
content and standards are different from those for
metro stations of the country. There is merit in this
submission.
Besides. In the absence of specific
allegations of malafides or discriminatory treatment or
manifest arbitrariness in the selection process, the
Court cannot substitute its opinion for the opinion of
the expert committees, in the instant case that of the
Selection/Preview Committee. Additionally, it may be
noticed that the petitioner himself has not even
availed of the option of telecasting of the serial on
DD-2.
In view of the foregoing discussion, the
writ petition has no merit and is dismissed.