Delhi High Court Directs Immediate Restoration Of X Accounts 'Dr Nimo Yadav', 'Nehr Who'

The Delhi High Court on Monday (April 06) ordered immediate restoration of the parody account “Dr. Nimo Yadav”, operated by petitioner Prateek Sharma on X.

Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav passed the order while hearing a plea filed by Prateek Sharma against blocking of his parody account “Dr. Nimo Yadav”.

The court also passed similar direction with respect to a petition filed by Kumar Nayan, who operates the account Nehr Who— one of the 12 X accounts blocked under MeiTY's directives.

The Court issued the direction after a brief exchange between advocate Vrinda Grover appearing for the petitioner and ASG Chetan Sharma appearing for the Union of India, as the Court examined the blocking orders issued under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act.

After hearing the matter for some time the court directed that while the petitioner's entire account must be restored immediately, the specific allegedly objectionable tweets mentioned in the blocking order will remain under temporary block.

The court further directed the petitioner to appear before Review Committee, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and MeiTY shall demonstrate whether tweets are correctly blocked or not as per Section 69A IT Act. The court further directed that principles of natural justice shall be followed before the Review Committee.

A detailed copy of the order is awaited.

Earlier in the hearing, Grover argued that the petitioner had moved the high court on March 25 after receiving a platform notification (X) that there was an order passed that the petitioner's account is to be withheld on March 19.

She submitted that petitioner received no communication at all from the Union Government. She said that the communication from Union had come after the petitioner had filed a petition before the high court.

“What is the legal scheme? The legal scheme cannot be that you violate my fundamental rights, when I move a constitutional court then in order to avoid judicial scrutiy you quickly send me...that can never be the scheme in this country...Reasons have to be in the order, and blocking is of information. Blocking order passed by Respondent No.1 (UOI) is to withhold my entire account, not information...This is a totally illegal arbitrary order. To ask me now, after you have blocked my account (not url) on March 19, you say now that ' you come to the Review Committee',” Grover submitted adding that the petitioner's account be re-opened.

She added that the order was not within the domain of Section 69A IT Act.

ASG Chetan Sharma had submitted that emails had been sent to the petitioner with respect to appearing before the review committee, MeITY. He relied on Rule 14 of the Blocking Rules, insisting that the petitioner could appear immediately before the Committee. "Let her appear today, because we sent another email on 4th (April)...that exercise is necessary...there are three things, her March 19 communication states that till date no government authority has contacted me issued notice or provided opportunity to be heard, so this basically on pnj (principles of natural justice). Rule 14 is on PNJ," the ASG said.

The Court was also hearing a fresh plea filed by Kumar Nayan, who operates the account Nehr Who, also one of the 12 accounts blocked under MeITY's directives.

Earlier, X Corp had informed the Court that the account has been blocked on the orders of Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) for controversial posts and defaming Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

In an affidavit filed before the High Court, the blocking order said that the X account contains “defamatory posts” wherein photographs, videos and Al manipulated content have been used to create controversial posts questioning the Government and defaming the PM.

X had also asked the Central Government to review the order directing to block 12 Twitter accounts, including “Dr. Nimo Yadav's”, calling the blocking order disproportionate.

On March 19, X wrote an objection letter to the Union Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, saying that the blocking order issued on March 18 fails to comply with Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000.

In its objection letter, X has said that the vast majority of the content in each of the X accounts does not appear to fall within the grounds specified under Section 69A and thus the Blocking Order issued is not proportionate.

It had further added that no opportunity of hearing has been granted to any of the account holders and that the blocking order does not demonstrate that reasonable efforts are to be made for identifying the person whose content is ordered to be blocked.

Advocates Vrinda Grover, Soutik Banerjee, Nakul Gandhi, Apar Gupta, Devika Tulsiani, Siddhi Sahoo, Gurdeep Singh and Indumugi C appeared for Sharma.

Advocates Apar Gupta, Nakul Gandhi Naman Kumar, Avanti Deshpande and Indumugi C appeared for Nayan.

Case Title: Prateek Sharma v. Union of India