Click to play videoNew Delhi: Two weeks ago, a sting operation conducted by private news channel Live India, purportedly blowing the lid off a sex racket, nearly led to riots in the Turkman Gate area of old Delhi.
At the centre of the raging controversy was schoolteacher Uma Khurana who was shown to be the kingpin of the racket involving young school girls of Sarvoday Kanya Vidyalaya.
She was publicly humiliated, sacked from the school and jailed.
But a fresh twist in the tale came when the sting backfired on the channel and it was revealed that the exercise was fake.
The channel is now in deeper trouble with the Information and Broadcasting ministry sending it a showcause notice asking why its licence should not be cancelled.
To cap it all, the Delhi High Court has asked the police why Live India has not been charged with criminal conspiracy.
“You do sting ops to expose bad things, we don’t mind. But you cannot interfere in private lives iof people in the name of sting,” says the petitioner, Rahul Kumar.
The Delhi Police also admit that the sting may not be authentic.
In a report to the High Court, the police say that Khurana can only be charged under the Immoral Trafficking Act because she escorted Rashmi Singh to meet Live India reporter Prakash with the intention of forcing her into prostitution.
“Uma has been absolved of all charges by the police. It’s disgusting the way channels are prying into the private lives of people,” said Khurana’s lawyer K K Singh.
Meanwhile, the High Court has also asked the Information and Broadcasting Ministry for a status report on the Broadcast Bill which must be filed by Monday.
Khurana will have to wait for two more weeks before she knows if the Delhi government will reinstate her as a teacher.
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