New Delhi

The Supreme Court on Wednesday strongly criticised hate speech through visual media, including the role of TV anchors.

It emphasized that it poisons the fabric of our society and questioned the government for being a mute spectator, instead of playing a lead role in curbing such speeches.

A bench of Justices KM Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy said that the role of the anchors during a TV debate is very important, as it pulled up TV channels over hate speech.

The bench also pointed out that it is the anchor's duty to see that hate speech is not used during the broadcast of a show.

"Where is our nation headed? Hate speech poisons very fabric... cannot permit it," Justice Joseph said.

The apex court also pulled up the Centre's counsel on the issue of hate speech. "Why is the government standing mute... why is all this happening? People will come and go and the nation will have to endure," he added.

The bench suggested there should be a system in place and there should be some methodology to conduct the show on TV, and the anchor should not run-down people.

"You run down a person. Just see what that person feels... you ridicule someone on a daily basis, it is like killing someone slowly," said Justice Joseph.

The bench told the Centre's counsel that the government should not treat the issue of hate speech as a trivial matter and take lead on developing mechanisms to curb it.

It said the government should not take an adversarial stand but assist the court and scheduled the matter for further hearing in November.

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It also asked the Centre to clarify if it intends to act on Law Commission recommendations on curbing hate speech.