Defamation has been defined as ‘publication of a statement which tends to lower a person in the estimation of right-thinking members of society generally or which tends to make them shun or avoid that person.’ It amounts to a tort of defamation only if the published statement is false or is capable of bearing a defamatory meaning. When an action is brought in a court, a judge must decide whether the ‘words’ in their ordinary and natural meaning are capable of bearing defamatory meaning. The ordinary and natural meaning of words should be gathered by considering a strictly literal interpretation and also from the general inference drawn by the ordinary person who heard or read the words. Defamation is not restricted to statements of facts. Certain statements expressing opinion may also be defamatory. To constitute the tort of defamation, the publication or communication of the false statement must be made to at least one person other than the person defamed and other than the author’s own husband or wife and every consecutive repetition of the statement is considered as a fresh commission of the tort. In a suit for defamation at common law, defence was available to a distributor who did not know that the publication was a libel. Now, under the Defamation Act, 1996 defence can be applied where the distributor or other secondary publisher did not know that he was causing or contributing to the publication of a libel.
