Andhra Pradesh High Court Seeks Twitter's Explanation For Failing To Remove 'Derogatory' Content Against Judiciary, Judges

The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Monday sought an explanation from Twitter for its failure to remove several 'derogatory' comments posted against the judiciary and some High Court judges as per High Court's order. Twitter has been called upon to file a reply by February 7, 2022.A division bench comprising Chief Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice M. Satyanarayana Murthy is currently hearing a suo moto case in connection with abusive and threatening social media posts made by certain members of the ruling party of Andhra Pradesh against judges of the High Court.Essentially, in October 2021, the Court had directed the Social Media Intermediaries (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc) to remove derogatory content/URLs/IDs against judiciary and judges within 36 hours (as informed to them by Registrar General and CBI, which is presently probing the case). However, on Monday (January 31, 2022) the Additional Solicitor General of India, informed that Twitter has not taken off the subject URLs despite the information being sent to it by the High Court or by the C.B.I. The Court was told that if any user tries to have access to Twitter by mentioning his nationality as India, the said URLs are not visible, but, if the same user again tries to have access by mentioning his nationality as belonging to any other country, the same URLs are accessible from the territory of India. Thus, ASG told the Court that Twitter is not following the orders of this Court. Also, Counsel N. Ashwini Kumar appearing for the petitioner, also informed the Court that Twitter is accessible in India by making change in VPN. Therefore, the Court has now asked the counsel appearing for Twitter to explain the position and file an affidavit on the above aspect.The background of the CaseIt may be noted that in 2020, a division bench of Chief Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice Lalitha Kanneganti had issued suo moto contempt notices to 49 persons, including a Member of Parliament and a former Member of Legislative Assembly, observing that they made intimidating and abusive social media posts against judges.Therefore, the High Court had transferred the probe in the matter to CBI and had directed it to investigate the derogatory social media posts against judges.Click Here To Read/Download Order

Andhra Pradesh High Court Seeks Twitter's Explanation For Failing To Remove 'Derogatory' Content Against Judiciary, Judges

Sparsh Upadhyay

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