Tanisha Rana
Published on: September 8, 2022 at 22:22 IST
The Delhi High Court was informed on Wednesday by the Central Government that regulations regarding users who are permanently blocked or de-platformed by social media platforms will be released “at some time in the future” and will be prospective in nature.
Central Government Standing Counsel (CGSC) Kirtiman Singh made an oral argument in support of this before Justice Yashwant Varma.
“We have checked up with the government, the amendment will take place at some point of time, but it will be prospective,” Singh said.
Before delving into the case’s main issues, Justice Varma needed to know whether the Centre was putting any regulatory procedures in place since the government’s policies would affect the petitions before it.
“We are currently deciding the question whether writ petitions against these social media companies are maintainable… We want to understand whether there is any regulatory mechanism that they (Centre) want to implement that might have an impact on this,” the judge said.
Counsel representing users of banned social media names urged for a hearing after Singh said that it is clear when the rules will be released.
After then, Justice Varma stated that the Court would review the case and reach a decision if the Centre had not clarified its position by the next hearing date.
The matter is now scheduled for further consideration on December 19.
A number of cases involving the suspension of social media accounts were being heard in court, including petitions submitted by senior attorney Sanjay Hegde and parody accounts like Wokeflix.
The Bench is essentially determining whether a lawsuit against Twitter and other social media intermediaries is valid and if they qualify as “states” under Article 12 of the Indian Constitution.
The Centre was questioned by the Court in August about whether any regulatory measures were being considered to address the issue of excluding Indian nationals from social media sites.
According to Justice Varma, the entire process would have to be redone if the government developed these rules while the Court was deliberating the case.
Prior to that, the Centre had informed the High Court that any action taken by social media sites against accounts should be proportionate to the offensive material, with the account’s deletion being the final choice.
In an affidavit, it was also stated that social media providers should only delete an account when the majority of the postings and material are illegal.
Social networking sites like Twitter have maintained that because they are private companies and users sign contracts with them when they sign up, there is no cause of action against them.
