Big TV anchor Aparna Kurup said nothing that justified a criminal case. During a TV debate on the Grand Mufti’s diktat restricting where Muslim women could go and who they could be seen with, she questioned why such strict rules were being imposed on women when the same religious establishment had, at different times, taken a more flexible view of issues such as extramarital relationships and intoxicant use. She had said, there are religious leaders “who consider men having extramarital sex, consuming ganja and MDMA (synthetic drug), as the sunnath in kithab (the Quran)” and Sunnat indicates approval in Islam.
Her point was part of a debate about women, religion and religious authority. She apologised unconditionally the next day after facing political pressure, and her channel removed the clip. That should have ended the matter.
Instead, Kurup who works as the senior co-ordinating editor and anchor of BIG TV, now faces an FIR filed by the Kochi city cyber police. The case alleges that her remarks could provoke riots, hurt religious feelings and create hatred between communities. The complaint was filed by a man from Kasaragod who was not even present in the studio.
According to the FIR, she faces charges of provocation to cause riots, outraging religious feelings, uttering words intended to hurt religious sentiments and making statements promoting enmity/hatred between groups
🙏 https://t.co/AiILdou0L4— Padmaja Joshi (@PadmajaJoshi) September 10, 2026
This is how overreach looks like.
Kurup’s Complaint Died In Few Days While Complaint Against Her Stays
Before Kurup was booked, she had filed a complaint against Dr Abdulla Basil CP, a social commentator who had criticised her on social media over the same remarks. The cyber police acted on her complaint too, booking Basil on September 5 under charges related to riots, criminal intimidation and spreading rumours through the IT Act.
But that FIR lasted only four days. Muslim organisations, including IUML MLAs, strongly objected. Najeeb Kanthapuram MLA called it condemnable that a case had been filed against a man who was speaking out against communal remarks. The Kerala Police, under the Congress-led government, then stopped pursuing the case.
Kurup got no such relief. Her FIR remains in place. No political group with influence is asking the cyber police to drop it.
The story is simple: a complaint filed by a Hindu woman journalist against a Muslim commentator was dropped within four days after political pressure. A complaint against the same journalist, filed by a Muslim man from another district, continues. That is not equal treatment under the law. It is a system responding to whoever has the political strength to apply pressure.
Where Is Everyone Who Is Supposed To Care About This?
The Editors Guild of India has a ready-made response for press freedom violations. It is often quick to speak up when a journalist seen as sympathetic to the right faces a UAPA case or tax raid. But Kurup has been booked under serious charges that could lead to years in prison for a TV remark she had already withdrawn. There has been nothing but silence.
Kerala’s feminist voices, usually quick to speak about clerics telling women what to wear and where they can go, have said nothing about a woman journalist being booked for objecting to exactly such restrictions. Liberal opinion pages in Delhi, which often react quickly when a female journalist is trolled, doxxed or sued, have also shut their mouth in this case.
The same free-speech supporters who invoke Article 19(1)(a) when a comedian is booked for a joke about a Hindu god are nowhere to be seen. No social media campaign, petition or statement of support. An active FIR carrying the possibility of prison for a woman journalist has somehow failed to attract their attention.
The Reason For Silence Is Very Clear
Kurup had questioned Islamist clerics and the political groups supporting them in Kerala. Defending her would mean openly criticising Kanthapuram’s regressive comments and questioning the IUML’s political influence over the Kerala Police. That is uncomfortable in a state where both the LDF and the Congress-led opposition need Muslim votes. The same applies to media and freedom of speech activists – they do not want to rub the wrong side of the Islamist ecosystem.
There is no reason Kurup’s remarks should have become a criminal case. She made an argument about religious double standards on a news panel, exactly the kind of discussion TV debates are meant for. She then apologised anyway, quickly and unconditionally, hoping to end the controversy. It did not work. Islamist groups treated the apology as weakness, and an FIR followed. Yet when an FIR was filed against one of their own, the same groups used political pressure to get it dropped. In both cases, the outcome appeared to depend less on the facts and more on who could bring political pressure.
A woman journalist is now facing prosecution for criticising a cleric’s control over women’s movement, while her own complaint against a male critic disappeared after political pressure. That is not equal treatment. It is a system where political calculations appear to matter more than the law. And Kerala’s champions of women’s rights and press freedom have chosen not to notice.
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