Raajje Television pays MVR 200K in defamation fines

Raajje Television has paid the MVR 200,000 imposed on it under the defamation law.

Earlier in March, the station was fined for a piece it reported about an investigation into a rape case and a senior state official who was allegedly influencing it, citing the victim’s family.

This same verdict – put forth by the Maldives Broadcasting Commission (MBC) for alleged violation of broadcast regulations – also fined a former journalist with the station by a sum of MVR 50,000.

“Punishing this station broadcasting the piece without relevant institutions conducting a transparent investigation- while the victim’s family consistently maintained that the individual has been influencing the case- is unjustly conducive to allowing individuals in power to punish those who are not” Raajje Television’s statement said, criticizing the MBC for the fine.

The commission had stated that the fine, levied on 7th March, be paid before the 30th.

On March 10th, the station had also launched a fund-raising drive – called the Dignity Fund – to accumulate the sum needed to pay the fine, and several others against the station. Said fund had garnered much support as viewers in the outer lying atolls had established their own donation boxes in solidatiy with the Dignity Fund.

Two other journalists with the station have also been fined by MVR 28,800 for ‘obstruction of justice’ after they were arrest while covering a bomb scare in Malé City, and their cameraman, Adam Zareer, was fined by MVR 3,000 – in what the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) had described as undemocratic and unjust charges.

The station has reported that another fine of MVR 800,000 is yet impending.