Hiru Media Network has said it will send a “strong” legal response within 24 hours to Labour Minister K.D. Lal Kantha’s defamation notice, and separately disowned a document circulating on social media which purported to show the broadcaster asking the police for protection.
The legal notice — dated April 18 and served on Asia Broadcasting Corporation (Pvt) Ltd, Hiru’s parent company — alleges that a news segment aired on April 16 misrepresented the minister’s 2025 assets and liabilities declaration as exceeding Rs. 460 million, a figure the minister says was “deliberately exaggerated and misinterpreted,” particularly in relation to property and company shares held in his daughter’s name.
Hiru has already publicly retracted the original figures on Saturday, attributing the overstatement to a calculation error. The outlet said the correct securities value in the declaration was approximately Rs. 143,475 — not Rs. 383.9 million — and that the minister’s total declared gross assets stood at roughly Rs. 80 million.
In a fresh notice issued Monday, the broadcaster confirmed it would formally respond to the minister’s Rs. 10 billion damages notice and condemned what it described as an attempt to tarnish its reputation via a forged document. Deputy News Director Tharanga Dinusha Jayakody said the letter circulating online, claiming Hiru had requested IGP protection, was “completely false.”
“Hiru Media Network has not made any such request to the Inspector General of Police,” Jayakody said in a statement, warning that legal action would be taken against those responsible for preparing and circulating the fake document.
The dispute sits alongside a separate media-ministry complaint filed by the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation over Hiru’s reporting on a disputed $286-per-barrel diesel figure — leaving the broadcaster fighting two high-profile credibility fronts simultaneously.
Source: Newswire.
