MEDIA TRIALS

Media trial is when the media takes on the part of the investigator, prosecutor and judge and influences the public opinion by passing a prior judgement in a case, deviating from journalism and sometimes entering into the judicial domain. The entire scenario becomes crucial when the privacy of the victim or the convict is hindered and often an early perception leads to public outrage.

Media trials pose the question of the difference between freedom of the press and overstepping the journalism boundaries. Healthy and apt journalism is to deliver facts and shape public perception only to their own discretion and not feed pre-set decisions into the public minds. In many cases, media is so involved in highlighting the victim or the convict that false narratives are set, continuous stories are run and too much is read between the lines that the lawful rights of both the sides are snatched. One such example is the Sushant Singh Rajput case, where everybody who was summoned by the court had to face media trials and ultimately faced major public backlash, which not only affected their career prospects but snatched their rights as the citizens of the country. For months, various people involved, for example Rhea Chakraborty, had no privacy, faced social media outrage, and were subject to extreme public hatred, only to be proven not guilty. This proves the futility of media trials which is nothing more than a facade to attract more readership or viewership at the stake of judicial rights of the people involved.

While freedom of the press is crucial for a nation but it is not without ethical journalism that it can be exercised. The functions of the judicial system should be left unhindered and each stakeholder should perform their own functions under their domain.