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Is it ok to omit "which is" from "which is why", and simply use "why" to start a subordinate clause?
E.g. "My television was broken, why I spent the evening reading a book."
"So" might be better to use, but my question is if it is correct to use "why" on its own in this case.
No, you can't just simply leave out the "which is" from the "which is why", because these two have different meanings. "Which is why" = something happened, because..., as a single "why" is used for questions.
The sentence
"My television was broken, why I spent the evening reading a book."
is wrong. The second half of this sentence would imply a question, i.e.:
"He asked why I spent the evening reading a book."
But as you said, you could use the "so" in this sentence and it would be correct:
"My television was broken, so I spent the evening reading a book."