In a judgment delivered by Justice Krishna S Dixit, the court found Twitter's plea to be lacking in merit and imposed a substantial penalty of Rs 50 lakh on the company. The court's decision upholds the government's authority to block tweets and accounts
The Karnataka High Court has바카라 웹사이트dismissed a petition filed by Twitter Inc., challenging several blocking and take-down orders issued by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, saying that바카라 웹사이트company's plea was "devoid of merits".
The single-judge bench of Justice Krishna S Dixit which dictated the operative portion of the judgement also imposed a whopping바카라 웹사이트cost of Rs 50 lakh on Twitter and ordered it to be paid to the Karnataka State Legal Services Authority within 45 days.
Reading the operative portion, the HC said, "In the above circumstances this petition being devoid of merits is liable to be dismissed with exemplary costs and accordingly it is. Petitioner is levied with an exemplary cost of Rs 50 lakh payable to the Karnataka State Legal Service Authority, Bengaluru, within 45 days. If delay is brooked, it attracts an additional levy of Rs 5,000 per day."
"I am convinced with contention of the Centre that they have powers to block tweets and block accounts," the judge said while dismissing Twitter's petition.
Out of a total of바카라 웹사이트1,474 accounts and 175 tweets, Twitter challenged the blocking of 39 URLs. The platform argued that바카라 웹사이트the direction to block entire accounts falls afoul of Section 69A of the Information바카라 웹사이트Technoloy Act.
Twitter had claimed that the blocking orders are "procedurally and substantially deficient of the provision" and "demonstrate excessive use of powers and are disproportionate".바카라 웹사이트
The platform contended that the Central government was바카라 웹사이트not empowered바카라 웹사이트to issue general orders calling for the blocking of social media accounts and that the orders must contain reasons which should be communicated to users, as per a report by Bar and Bench.
It also stated that a blocking order could only be issued in a situation where the nature of the content was in line with the grounds laid down under바카라 웹사이트Section 69A of the IT바카라 웹사이트Act.바카라 웹사이트
The central government opposed the plea by Twitter challenging the blocking orders passed by the government of India, saying that the directions were바카라 웹사이트issued in "national and public interest and to prevent incidents of lynching and mob violence."
Additional Solicitor General of India바카라 웹사이트R Sankaranarayanan바카라 웹사이트appearing바카라 웹사이트for the Central government said that the government바카라 웹사이트is committed to "providing an open, safe, trusted and accountable internet to its citizens, and that its powers to block information has a limited scope."