Four film bodies and 34 leading production houses, including that of actors Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan and Aamir Khan, have filed a plea before the Delhi High Court against news channels and journalists for making “irresponsible, derogatory and defamatory remarks” against Bollywood.

The lawsuit has also sought to restrain them from interfering with the right to privacy of persons associated with the industry.

The news channels that have been named in the suit include Republic TV and Times Now, along with journalists Arnab Goswami, Pradeep Bhandari, Rahul Shivshankar and Navika Kumar.

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The plea has been filed by production houses of Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Ajay Devgn, Karan Johar, Akshay Kumar, Aditya Chopra, Farhan Akhtar, Zoya Akhtar and other major banners together as plaintiffs.

The Film &Television Producers Guild of India (PGI) and Cine & TV Artistes Association (CINTAA) are also a party in the plea.

The journalists and the news channels are accused of using derogatory words such as ‘dirt’, ‘filth’, ‘scum’, ‘druggies’.

They are also accused of using defaming expressions like ‘It is Bollywood where the dirt needs to be cleaned’, ‘All the perfumes of Arabia cannot take away the stench and the stink of this filth and scum of the underbelly of Bollywood’, ‘This is the dirtiest industry in the country’, and ‘cocaine and LSD drenched Bollywood’.

Notably, Republic TV is already facing investigation in a fake TRPs controversy case, along with two other Marathi channels.