BENGALURU: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday issued notice to the Union of India on a petition filed by Twitter Inc. The company operating the microblogging and social networking service Twitter, in its petition before the High Court challenged the multiple “blocking orders’ issued by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology from February 2, 2021 to February 28, 2022.
The orders under sections of the Information Technology Act were issued to block 1,474 accounts/URLs and 175 tweets from being accessed by the public, besides certain information which included suspension of whole accounts on Twitter.Hearing the petition filed by Twitter, Justice Krishna S Dixit ordered notice to the Centre and adjourned the hearing to August 25, 2022. This was at the request of senior counsels Mukul Rohatgi and Ashok Harnalli, representing Twitter Inc.
In its petition filed before the HC, Twitter stated that contents of Twitter accounts and tweets in question that were ordered to be blocked by the Union government fell under the freedom of speech guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution and did not violate Section 69A of Information Technology Act. It also highlighted several originators of tweets were identifiable public figures and some of the URLs contained political and journalistic content.
Blocking info violation of freedom of speech: Twitter to High Court
It contended that blocking of information from public access without issuing notice to the originators was gross violation of freedom of speech guaranteed to citizen-users of the Twitter Inc platform.
The court permitted Twitter Inc to furnish documents — the blocking order — which it referred to in its pleadings in a sealed cover and that the same should be deposited in the safe custody of the court.
The court also said it was open to Twitter Inc to serve those documents to the Central Government Panel counsel.
Rohatgi argued that blocking rules required reasons to be recorded for issuance of orders to block the accounts/URLs, as Twitter Inc was answerable to individual account holders to block their accounts. But no reasons were given while issuing such orders to block objectionable tweets. If such an order was complied with as it is, Twitter Inc would lose its entire business and would have to be closed, the senior counsel argued.
Twitter Inc stated that pursuant to the blocking orders, the Ministry issued a communication dated June 27, 2022 directing Twitter Inc to comply, failing which it would prescribe serious consequences against Twitter Inc, that is, withdrawal of the protection under Section 79(1) of the IT Act, as well as initiation of criminal proceedings under the provisions of the IT Act.
Highlighting that several of the originators of tweets were identifiable public figures and that some of the URLs contained political and journalistic content, Twitter Inc stated in the petition that contents of the twitter accounts and tweets in question by the Union government fell under the freedom of speech guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) of the constitution and did not violate Section 69A of Information Technology Act.
Twitter Inc stated that to the best of its knowledge no notice under Rule 8 of the Blocking Rules had been provided to the user, nor any opportunity of hearing granted by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology by directing the intermediary to remove the content/account of users without following the procedure laid down by the apex court to prevent the misuse blocking power”, Twitter Inc alleged.
It has also contended that the action of suspension was not a temporary measure but would amount to the user whose account is blocked from accessing services on Twitter permanently.There was no time limit specified in the orders in question, nor was there any review mechanism provided for reconsideration of the decision after a period of time. This is further evidence of the disproportionate nature of the blocking orders, Twitter claimed.
It was also stated in the petition that the blocking rules provide a format under Rule 6(2) of the act for a complaint initiating the blocking process by a Nodal Officer. However, the Rules do not prescribe a similar standard format for the passing of a blocking order. This shows legislative intent that a blocking order must be descriptive in nature, with application of mind and reasons to be recorded on a case to case basis. Failure to provide detailed reasons goes to the root of the matter and renders the orders liable to be quashed, Twitter Inc argued.