The Secretary, Ministry Of ... vs Cricket Association Of Bengal & ... on 9 February, 1995 crime, for the protection of health or morals. for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary." 38.The next question which is required to be answered is whether there is any distinction between the freedom of the print media and that of the electronic media such as radio and television, and if so, whether it necessitates more restrictions on the latter media. 39. Eric Barendt in his book titled " Broadcasting Law [1993 Edn.] which presents a comparative study of the law in five' legal systems, viz., Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy and United States of America, has dealt with the subject succinctly. He has referred to a number of reasons which are generally put forward to justify broadcasting regulations and has dealt with each of them. The first reason advanced is that because the airwaves are a public resource, the Government or some agency on its behalf, is entitled to license their use for broadcasting on the terms it sees fit. A similar argument can now be deployed in respect of cable broadcasting where an authority must give permission before roads can be dug up for laying cable. The learned author states that the case is unconvincing for it infers that it is right for the Government to regulate broadcasting from the fact that it has opportunity to do this. It would be perfectly possible for Government to allocate frequencies for cable franchises without programme conditions on the basis of a competitive tender and allow the resale by the purchaser. The argument, according to the author, therefore, does not work. It does not justify broadcasting regulations but almost explains how it is feasible. The author, however, does not accept the objection to this reason for regulation that thereby Government acts improperly by using their licensing power to purchase broadcasters' constitutional right to speech. According to the author, this argument is less persuasive as it assumes that broadcasters enjoy the same constitutional rights of free speech as individuals talking in a bar or leafletting in a high street. The author then deals with the second reason given for regulation of broadcasting, viz., scarcity of frequencies and points out that this argument referred to in Red Lion Broadcasting case [supra] is less clear than ap- pears at first sight, since it is not clear whether the scarcity of frequencies refers to the limited number allocated by the Government as available for broadcasting or to the actual numerical shortage of broadcasting stations. If it is the former, the scarcity is an artificial creation of the Government rather than a natural phenomenon since it reserves a number of frequencies for the use of the army, police and other public services. The Government is then not in a good position to argue for restrictions on broadcasters' freedom. The author then points out that as far as the actual scarcity of broadcasting stations is concerned, there has been an increase in the last 20 years in the broadcasting stations in the United States while there are fewer newspapers than there used to be. Similar developments have occurred in European countries in the same period, especially, since the advent of cable and satellite. Further the scarcity argument cannot be divorced from economic considerations. The shortage of frequencies and the high cost of starting up broadcasting channel explain their dearth in comparison with the number of newspapers and magazines in 1961. However, it is now probably as difficult to finance a new newspaper as it is a private television channel, if not more so. Lastly, the author points out that the scarcity argument is much less tenable than it used to be. Cable and satellite have significantly increased the number of available or potentially available channels so that there are more broadcasting outlets than there are national or local daily newspapers. Dealing with the third reason advocated for giving differential treatment to Indian Kanoon - http://indiankanoon.org/doc/539407/ 23