Form "Press Council Of Tamil Nadu" To Eliminate Fake Journalists: Madras High Court

The Council shall comprise representatives from the journalism industry, as well as the government and all members shall be serving journalists of standing and government servants.

In a bid to weed out fake journalists, the Tamil Nadu government should constitute within three months, a press council, the Madras High Court has ruled. The Press Council of Tamil Nadu should be headed by a retired judge of the Supreme Court or High Court, with its members being a team of experienced and reputed journalists, both working and retired, retired civil servants and police officials in the rank of IAS and IPS, the court said in its direction to the state government recently. The Council shall comprise representatives from the journalism industry, as well as the government and all members shall be serving journalists of standing and government servants. The members shall be on regular payroll of media houses and organisations, evidenced by salary slips, payment of TDS and circulation or viewership details, as the case may be. Loss of job on any account such as resignation, dismissal or death and disability shall result in their immediate exit from the board, a division bench of Justices N Kirubakaran (since retired) and P Velmurugan said.