Punjab & Haryana High Court Issues Notice On Plea Challenging Blocking Of Lawyer's Twitter Handle By Punjab Police

The Punjab & Haryana High Court has issued notice on a plea seeking directions to Punjab Police to unblock a Twitter account being run by a lawyer. The plea also alleges that officials are operating the social media accounts of various police districts and commissionerates without any valid legal sanction. 

Justice Vinod S. Bharadwaj issued the notice to the respondents and listed the matter for hearing on October 12.

The lawyer Nikhil Saraf said he runs the Twitter account “Police Corruption India” to highlight issues related to governance, human rights violations and issues of corruption among police officials. Saraf said the account was blocked in 2022 by the handles being run by various police districts and Commissionerates of Punjab Police.

“The blocking of the said publication is a direct onslaught of the freedom of press, which is unconstitutional and illegal, as blocking of the said publication was without following due procedure established by law, without any reasoning,” Saraf argued in the petition.

Saraf further said he has been continuously raising the issue of police and jail reforms and highlighting the "culture of protecting and promoting" the corrupt in the Punjab Police. Alleging that his account was arbitrarily blocked, Saraf said officials could not have opened the accounts without valid legal sanction.

“That it is pertinent to point out that the social media publications of the various Police Districts and Commissionerates of the Respondents are used to communicate with the general public at large, hence it's imperative that there are certain rules/ directions which address the issues like, who is authorized to open such accounts on various social media platforms, who is authorized to operate, what kind of content can be published, who is authorized to create that content, which people and accounts to follow, whether sharing/ retweeting is allowed etc.,” states the petition.

Case Title: NIKHIL SARAF V/S STATE OF PUNJAB AND ANOTHER

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