Digital and social media have been of late crossing the red lines and resorting to personalized agenda driven attacks on the judiciary besides also holding media trials. In modern India the media is the tribunal cum appellate , the police announce judgement and the court reads it out like the news. A judge presiding over the hearing of a suspended BJP spokesperson has called for a mechanism to regulate SM in order to preserve the rule of law under the Constitution. The court made many scathing remarks against the defendant ( perhaps it reflects their frustation at what India has been reduced to under the Sanghis) which sparked a debate on online platforms leading to some very uncharitable remarks against the judges as well. Some vile, vitriolic posts went so far as to refer to the Supreme Court as Supreme Kotha ( red light area). India is not a mature or informed democracy, social media is employed to politicize purely legal and constitutional issues and drive the saffron agenda often imputing motives to judges. Media trials are an obstruction , create biases, undermine jurisprudence and interfere in the justice dispensation system. Attacks attempted on judges will lead to a dangerous scenario where judgements would be coloured by what the media thinks rather than what the law actually mandates. This puts the rule of law on the back burner ignoring the sanctity and respect for courts. The executive and the legislature of the country are actively abetting the undermining of the judiciary both by acts of omission and commission aided by a rabid partisan media; add to that the whole social media circus mudding the waters further and you have a recipe for social and democratic disaster.
