NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday restrained several Youtube channels from publishing some objectionable videos of Aaradhya Bachchan, daughter of actors Abhishek and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan which were circulating fake news about the 11-year-old’s health.
“Every child is entitled to be treated with honour and respect whether he/she is a child of a celebrity or a commoner. Circulating information with respect to the mental and physical health of children is completely impermissible in law,” Justice C Hari Shankar observed while stopping the circulation of fake news by nine entities through their Youtube channels.
The court observed that it’s not the first time that such misleading information is being circulated in respect of celebrities where the information is alleged to be a child of tender years. “.. it reflects a morbid perversity on the part of the persons circulating such information, with complete apathy to the interests of the child in question,” the judge remarked.
“Defendants are completely restrained from disseminating on any platform available across the internet relating to the mental or physical health of the plaintiff (Aaradhya),” the judge ordered while issuing notice to all defendants on the plea.
Petitioners Aaradhya Bachchan and Abhishek Bachchan were approaching the court to stop various YouTube channels and unknown people from publishing content that tarnished their image. As per the minor’s petition, “The defendants’ sole motivation is to unlawfully profit from the reputation of the Bachchan family, irrespective of the damage-causing to the plaintiffs and their family members.”
During the hearing, the petitioners’ counsel Dayan Krishnan submitted that the minor is a healthy school-going child studying in Dhirubhai Ambani International School in Mumbai and some miscreants merely for the sake of publicity over a period of time have been circulating videos on YouTube and stating that she is critically ill and that one of the videos claim that she was no more.
The high court also asked Google to reveal the identity of the defendant’s YouTube channels to immediately take steps to deactivate the URLs of these channels. Rapping Google, which owns YouTube, the high court said, they have a responsibility to see that “proper information is disseminated on the platform. “You are providing a platform where misinformation is being circulated to the public.