In a relief to veteran Telugu actor Mohan Babu, the Supreme Court on Thursday ordered that the Telangana police shall not take any coercive action against him for allegedly assaulting a journalist.
A bench of Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra issued a notice to the state police and asked it to file a response in four weeks.
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The veteran actor had challenged the December 23 Telangana High Court order denying him anticipatory bail. The allegation against Babu is that he took a wireless mic from a journalist and threw it on him causing grievous injuries.
Appearing for Babu, senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, told the bench that Babu has an estranged son with whom there was a dispute and the son barged into his home along with a media crew of 20-30 people.
Rohatgi explained that in the heat of the moment, Babu threw the mic on the journalist. The actor is willing to issue a public apology and even compensate if required, the counsel added.
Advocate appearing for the journalist contended that the journalist had to spend five days in the hospital and had to go through a reconstruction surgery of the jaw and was fed food with a pipe.
