Karnataka HC: a defamation case can open without a witness who thinks less of the complainant

Justice Anant Ramanath Hegde dismissed the petition of MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal against a Bengaluru magistrate order taking cognizance of a defamation complaint, ruling that Explanation 4 to Section 356 BNS does not always demand a witness who personally holds the complainant in lower esteem.

Two witnesses told a Bengaluru magistrate that Shivananda S Patil’s reputation had fallen. Both also said they themselves thought well of him and that the allegations against him were false. On 12 November 2026 the Karnataka High Court held that this was enough to issue process for defamation against MLA Basanagouda Ramanagouda Patil Yatnal.

Justice Anant Ramanath Hegde dismissed the MLA’s petition in CRL.P No. 12881 of 2026 and, in the same order, answered a question of law that the court framed itself. The ruling is limited to the stage of taking cognizance. Everything on the merits stays with the trial court.

A YouTube broadcast and a private complaint

Mr Patil, the complainant, filed a private complaint on 18 July 2025 under Section 356 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. It concerned a statement the MLA allegedly made on 30 April 2025 on a channel named Gadinada Kranti, which was also broadcast on YouTube.

The complaint was registered as PCR No. 11492/2025 before the XLII Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Bengaluru. Mr Patil gave a sworn statement and cited three witnesses. At the time of the High Court hearing, two had been examined.

On 24 January 2026 the magistrate took cognizance of the offence under Section 500 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, which corresponds to Section 356(2) of the BNS. The order acted under Section 223 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, and directed that summons issue to the accused.

The magistrate’s 17-page order referred to the transcript of a pen drive, to video clippings and to the statements of the two witnesses. It also relied on Supreme Court rulings including Subramanian Swamy v. Union of India, Balraj Khanna v. Moti Ram, Chaman Lal v. State of Punjab and Arjun Panditrao Khotkar.

From revision to the High Court

The MLA took the order to the LXXXI Additional Sessions Judge, Bengaluru, in Criminal Revision Petition No. 65/2025. On 18 August 2026 the Sessions Court dismissed the revision and confirmed the cognizance order, after looking at the same provisions and rulings.

He then came to the High Court under Section 528 of the BNSS. His prayers were to set aside both orders and to quash the entire proceedings in PCR No. 11492/2025.

What the MLA argued on Explanation 4

Mr Dalwai Venkatesh, Advocate, appeared for the MLA. His argument turned on three words in Explanation 4 to Section 356(1) of the BNS, which says an imputation harms a person’s reputation only if it lowers that person in the estimation of others.

The complainant and both witnesses had said his reputation was lowered in the estimation of others, counsel pointed out. But no one in whose own estimation it was lowered had come forward. Unless such a person states so before the court, he said, the Explanation is not met and cognizance cannot be taken.

The witnesses, he added, had said the allegations were false even as they said the reputation had suffered. The Explanation, in other words, was being satisfied by a bare assertion.

The complainant’s answer

Mr Ravi B Naik, Senior Counsel, appeared for Mr Patil. He said the contents of the complaint set out the statements made, the accused had not disputed making them, and the statements were per se defamatory. They had also been widely circulated on social media.

The complainant had stated on oath that his reputation was lowered in the estimation of others. Two witnesses said the same. Because the statement was per se defamatory, counsel argued, a magistrate need not insist on a third person saying his own estimation of the complainant had fallen.

The question the court framed

The court set out the question of law in its unnumbered opening paragraph, before the facts. The first half, which framed the dispute, read:

“whether Explanation-4 to Section 356(1) requires the complainant to examine a witness who would state that, in that person's own estimation, the complainant's reputation has been lowered”

The court began from the text. A plain reading of the words in the estimation of others, Justice Hegde said, does not mean only the estimation of witnesses examined before the court. Nor, in itself, does it require that the particular person whose opinion fell must be produced at the cognizance stage.

Possible damage to reputation, he wrote, may be inferred prima facie from the circumstances of the publication and from the imputation itself. The court added that in a given case a complainant may well be required to examine such a person, even when recording the sworn statement.

Two kinds of second-hand opinion

The witnesses in this case had a good opinion of the complainant but said that others thought less of him. The court said that may mean one of two things, and it separated them.

In the first, the witness personally heard another person say that, because of the imputation, he no longer held the complainant in the same esteem. In the second, the witness only heard about that opinion through someone else.

The court worked through two illustrations. In the first, A tells B he heard C say that D’s reputation had fallen in C’s estimation because of E’s imputation. A is a witness to C’s statement, and the fact that C said it is admissible.

In the second, A tells B he heard C say that D’s reputation had fallen in F’s estimation. A never heard F. His evidence of F’s opinion is hearsay.

Even in the first case, the court cautioned, the fact that someone else voiced an adverse opinion does not conclusively prove that the imputation lowered the reputation. If the statement or its significance is disputed, further evidence may be needed.

Why the witnesses were enough here

The court accepted that the two witnesses had not named the others in whose eyes the complainant had fallen. Where a witness has heard someone say so, it said, the fact that he heard it is admissible, though it may not be conclusive proof of what was said.

The decisive step came next. If the imputations are per se defamatory in the way Explanation 4 describes, the court may tentatively form the opinion that the reputation might have been lowered in the estimation of others, for the purpose of taking cognizance or issuing process.

The converse also holds. If the allegations are prima facie not defamatory, the court said, the magistrate may find the material insufficient and insist on better evidence. A mere assertion that reputation has fallen may not be enough in that situation.

Precedents that did and did not help

The court read John Thomas v. Dr K Jagadeesan as holding that a per se defamatory statement relieves the complainant of the burden of showing a lowered reputation in the estimation of the right-thinking public.

An accused cannot seek discharge merely because a publication is not per se defamatory, the court noted from that ruling, since the complainant can lead evidence at trial.

The court noted, however, that the Supreme Court did not make clear whether the witnesses there were examined to say the complainant’s reputation had fallen in their own estimation. That left the point open.

The MLA relied on Jaideep Bose v. Bid and Hammer Auctioneers Private Limited. There the Supreme Court set aside cognizance because the procedure under Section 202 of the Code was not followed for accused living outside the court’s jurisdiction. It also found no material that some accused had authored the publication.

Justice Hegde found the present case different. The Section 225 BNSS point was not raised, since the order came from a Special Designated Court. An MLA, he wrote, cannot say he lives outside the Bengaluru court’s territorial jurisdiction.

The trial court had also issued a pre-cognizance notice and heard the accused. And the complainant had examined witnesses who said his reputation was lowered in the estimation of the public.

Calcutta view not followed

The petitioner also relied heavily on the Calcutta High Court’s decision in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal. The court noted that the FIR there followed a publication and a complaint by an association through its Secretary, and that the publication was held not defamatory.

That court had also held that evidence of an independent witness is needed to say that in his own estimation the complainant’s reputation was lowered. Justice Hegde said he was not persuaded to follow that view, for the reasons already recorded.

The Madras High Court’s ruling in S. Ranganathan v. Radhakrishnan held that an inquiry under Section 202 of the Cr.P.C. must precede cognizance for an offence under Section 356 of the BNS. Here, he said, two witnesses were examined besides the complainant, so there was no procedural violation.

The statements themselves

The order reproduces the portion of the broadcast the complainant relied on, in Kannada. Having read it, the court said there was no difficulty in taking a prima facie view that the statements cast serious aspersions on the complainant’s integrity and character.

They were, it held, inherently capable of lowering his reputation. Even if the allegations were true, it added, whether the case falls under one of the exceptions to defamation can be considered by the court.

Whether the public or any person believed the imputation, or whether the reputation was in fact lowered, are questions for trial. At this stage, the court said, it need not consider whether the evidence is enough to convict.

Four cases that did not apply

The MLA also cited Manoj Kumar Tiwari v. Manish Sisodia and three Karnataka decisions: Jayappa v. Shamegowda, S P Bobati v. Mahadev Virupaxappa Latti and Sri M Krishna Reddy v. N R Ramesh.

Justice Hegde said that in those cases the accused were acquitted or the complaint was quashed because of the nature of the imputations. The imputations here were quite different, he said, and he did not find it necessary to describe the earlier ones.

The four conclusions

The court summed up its answer in four propositions. The first is that at the stage of cognizance and process, Explanation 4 to Section 499 of the IPC or Section 356(1) of the BNS

“does not necessarily mandate the complainant to examine a witness other than the complainant” (para 52)

The second is that whether such a witness is needed depends on the nature of the imputation, the other materials and the surrounding circumstances.

The third covers imputations that the court prima facie finds inherently capable of lowering the complainant’s moral or intellectual character, or of showing him as a person of bad character or as having done something generally considered disgraceful.

The court may then take cognizance on the statements of the complainant and the witnesses who say his reputation fell in the estimation of others.

The fourth covers imputations not prima facie capable of lowering reputation. A bare assertion by the complainant and his witness may then be insufficient. The magistrate may call for further material, or for a witness other than the complainant who says that in his own estimation the complainant’s reputation has fallen.

Order

The petition is dismissed. The High Court found no error in the cognizance order of the XLII Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate or in the revisional order of 18 August 2026.

The observations in the order are not an opinion on the merits of the complaint or on the defence of the accused. All contentions on merits are kept open for the trial court to decide. The order was reserved on 6 November 2026 and pronounced on 12 November 2026.