Karnataka Twitter Law Insider

Akansha Upadhyay

Published on: 17 November 2022 at 23:07 IST

Karnataka High Court has adjourned till December 12 Twitter’s plea challenging the orders of the state government blocking tweets, hashtags and handles linked to some farmers’ protest-related. Twitter Files Plea Against Karnataka Government’s Order to Block Accounts.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology sought time to present its arguments in the case following which Justice Krishna S Dixit adjourned the case. Twitter has approached the High Court challenging several blocking directions issued to it to remove tweets, accounts and URLs on the platform.

The social media platform, in its petition filed in June 2022, had claimed that the Center is required to issue notices to owners of Twitter handles against whom blocking orders have been issued.  The company claimed that it was also barred from informing its account holders about the removals.

Senior Advocates Arvind Datar and Ashok Haranahalli have argued on behalf of Twitter before the High Court in the last two months.

The main argument so far on behalf of Twitter is that the government’s blocking orders are against the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court in the Shreya Singhal case. This was the case in which the Supreme Court struck down Section 66A of the Information Technology Act.

Twitter has argued that those whose accounts are to be taken down should be given notice in advance.  It has also presented a list of accounts, tweets and URLs that the government has asked to be removed between February 2, 2021 and February 28, 2022.

The issue is regarding 10 government orders during this period in which the Centre directed the microblogging site to block 1,474 accounts, 175 Tweets, 256 URLs and one hashtag.

The blocking orders are under Section 69A of the IT Act which provides for blocking of content that is against the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India, pertains to defence of India, security of the State, friendly relationship with foreign states, public order and content which provokes or incites the commission of any offence.

Twitter has claimed that the orders are not in consonance with Section 69A of the IT Act.

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