Veerappan claims: Actor Sukanya wins defamation case after 30 years

Nearly 30 years after Sun TV Network aired journalist Nakheeran R. Gopal’s interview with forest robber Veerappan in 1996, the Madras High Court ordered the television network to pay ₹10,000 compensation to actor R. Sukanya for not processing scandalous allegations leveled against her by the interviewee.

Justice K. Kumaresh Babu dismissed a 2015 appeal filed by the television network against a decree passed in the actor’s favor by the Chennai City Civil Court. He blamed the malice shown against the TV channel, which should have verified the content of the interview before broadcasting.

The judge pointed out that Ms Sukanya, a popular actor who also teamed up with Kamal Haasan’s aging character Senapathy in the 1996 blockbuster Indian, had initially filed a civil suit in the Supreme Court in 1996 seeking ₹10 million in damages from the television network, Mr Gopal and the forest bandit.

On August 8, 2011, the lawsuit was transferred to the municipal civil court for jurisdiction. During the trial, the TV network maintained that it had no intention of defaming anyone and that it was Mr. Gopal who approached the channel to air the interview he had with the forest robber.

Mr. Gopal, on his part, told the court that under the telecast agreement entered into between him and the television network, the television network had the right to cut any part of the interview. He added that he had given nine hours of footage, but the TV channel only aired four hours of it over eight days, with each slot running for about 30 minutes a day.

On 15 April 2015, when the city civil court decided the suit in favor of Ms. Sukanya, it ordered the television network to pay her compensation of ₹10,000. Justice Babu said finding no reason to interfere with the decree, the TV channel did not take diligent steps to verify the content of the interview despite reserving unlimited right to edit, cut, delete, edit or change any part of the interview.

Also noting that the TV network had expressed regret in a Tamil magazine after receiving a legal notice from Ms Sukanya and not in its own channel in which the interview was aired, the judge wrote: “That alone would show malice on the part of the appellant.”

Published – 07 Jun 2026 20:53 IST