Karnataka HC to hear appeal by X against India's orders to take down certain tweets and accounts

Admitting an appeal by X (formerly Twitter) against a single-judge bench order which refused to stop the government from issuing orders to block certain tweets and accounts, a division bench of the Karnataka High Court will hear the case on November 9, 2023.

In June this year, a single-judge bench of Justice Krishna Dixit dismissed a petition by X against the Centre's order to block certain tweets and accounts. The bench had also imposed a fine of Rs 50 lakhs on X for challenging the Centre's order without complying with it.

Referring to Section 69 of the Information Technology (IT) Act, X told the division bench that the existing law mandates recording of the reasons for removing social media accounts and posts, adding that the Supreme Court of India while upholding the IT Act's Section 69 had ruled that the reasons must be clearly communicated in case someone wants to legally challenge them. However, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) argued that the reasons for blocking posts and accounts were known to X.

Asking how can a single-judge bench allow for the Centre's blocking orders not to be communicated if none less than that top court had allowed for the possibility of a legal challenge, the division bench of Justice G Narendar and Justice Vijaykumar A Patil said that even if the contents of a social media post or handle are against the public interest, the order to block them can be contested in a court of law.