TNI Bureau: The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to formulate guidelines for media reporting saying it cannot be made across the board. A bench headed by the Chief Justice of India, said that courts can defer the publication of news on a pending case.

The bench said that if an aggrieved person approached the court to prevent coverage of the case, the court can pass the postponement order for a short period.

The bench made it clear that only the Supreme Court and the High Courts can decide on the postponement of news.

Earlier, senior Supreme Court lawyer Ram Jethmalani had opposed formulating the guidelines for media reporting. He had said that the court should not decide the rules and guidelines for reporting. Let the media set the rules for itself and follow those, he added.