Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir, Salman’s production houses, 35 others approach court against ‘irresponsible reporting’ by some media houses

As many as 38 film bodies and production houses have filed a suit against a news channel and four journalists for defaming the Hindi film industry. Over the last couple of months, Bollywood became target of constant ridicule on news channels with derogatory terms being used for the industry.

Republic TV, Arnab Goswami, Pradeep Bhandari, Times Now, Rahul Shivshankar, Navika Kumar have been named in the suit filed before the Delhi High Court. Production houses of Shah Rukh Khan, Ajay Devgn, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Karan Johar, Akshay Kumar, Aditya Chopra, Farhan Akhtar, Zoya Akhtar and all other major banners have all come together as plaintiffs in the suit. The Film &Television Producers Guild of India (PGI) and Cine & TV Artistes Association (CINTAA) have also joined the suit.

The news channels are accused of using derogatory words such as "dirt", "filth", "scum", "druggies" and expressions such as "all the perfumes of Arabia cannot take away the stench and the stink of this filth and scum of the underbelly of Bollywood".

Here's a full list of plaintiffs:

1. The Film &Television Producers Guild of India (PGI) 2.

The Cine & TV Artiste? Association (CINTAA)

3. Indian Film and TV Producers Council (IFTPC)

4. Screenwriters Association (SWA)

5. Aamir Khan Productions

6. Ad-Labs Films

7. Ajay Devgn Fflims

8. Andolan Films

9. Anil Kapoor Film and Communication Network

10. Arbaaz Khan Productions

11. Ashutosh Gowariker Productions

12. BSK Network and Entertainment

13. Cape of Good Films

14. Clean Slate Filmz

15. Dharma Productions

16. Emmay Entertainment & Motion Pictures

17. Excel Entertainment

18. Filmkraft Productions

19. Hope Production

20. Kabir Khan Films

21. Luv Films

22. Macguffin Pictures

23. Nadiadwala Grandson Entertainment

24. One India Stories

25. R.S. Entertainment (Ramesh Sippy Entertainment)

26. Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra Pictures

27. Red Chillies Entertainment

28. Reel Life Productions

29. Reliance Big Entertainment

30. Rohit Shetty Picturez

31. Roy Kapur Films

32. Salman Khan Films

33. Sikhya Entertainment

34. Sohail Khan Productions

35. Tiger Baby Digital

36. Vinod Chopra Films

37. Vishal Bhardwaj Pictures

38. Yashraj Films

CINTAA has refused comment at this point, saying that the matter is subjudice'.

Republic TV is also embroiled in a fake TRPs controversy. Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh had claimed that Republic TV and two other Marathi channels had manipulated TRPs.

The TRP racket was unearthed after a police complaint by Hansa Research Group Pvt Ltd, the agency contracted by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to place audience meters to monitor TV channels watched by households.