Nagpur: Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court on Monday issued notices to Union Information and Broadcasting Ministry and Google India Pvt Ltd over a plea by a city-based software firm alleging violations of IT Act 2000 and IT Rules 2011.
A division bench comprising justices Bhushan Dharmadhikari and Swapna Joshi also issued notices to director general of computer emergency response team of India, executive officers of www.consumercomplaint.in and www.complaintboard.in, along with the directors of Adya Business Solutions (ABS) Anilkumar Singh, Chandrakant Prasad and Julie John. All of them have been asked to file reply by January 18.
The petitioner through counsels — Mahendra Limaye and Tushar Mandlekar— contended that it was necessary for websites to publish privacy rules, user agreement and publish name of the grievance officer to address to various complaints of citizens, as per the IT Act. Since the foreign websites have not done "statutory compliance", the action needs to be taken against them by the Centre for violation of IT Act, inviting even criminal action.
The petitioner alleged it was a "registered company" dealing in supply of software programmes related to "telecom solutions" to various clients and therefore, appointed franchisees in various part of India. The franchisees, however, failed to achieve their respective agreed sales-targets and therefore, violated the pact, which has a provision of paying compensation to petitioner.
The franchisee owners, however, posted certain objectionable, hateful, defamatory content against them on two Russian websites — www.consumercomplaint.in and www.complaintboard.in, instead of paying money.
The petitioner alleged these two websites were in fact creating confusion among citizens for propagating themselves as saviours of "consumer complaints" in India, defying the inbuilt legislative mechanism of "consumer forums" and receiving the "consumer related complaints". They also created virtual parallel mechanism that was derogatory and harmful in nature and was against "national interest".
A division bench comprising justices Bhushan Dharmadhikari and Swapna Joshi also issued notices to director general of computer emergency response team of India, executive officers of www.consumercomplaint.in and www.complaintboard.in, along with the directors of Adya Business Solutions (ABS) Anilkumar Singh, Chandrakant Prasad and Julie John. All of them have been asked to file reply by January 18.
The petitioner through counsels — Mahendra Limaye and Tushar Mandlekar— contended that it was necessary for websites to publish privacy rules, user agreement and publish name of the grievance officer to address to various complaints of citizens, as per the IT Act. Since the foreign websites have not done "statutory compliance", the action needs to be taken against them by the Centre for violation of IT Act, inviting even criminal action.
The petitioner alleged it was a "registered company" dealing in supply of software programmes related to "telecom solutions" to various clients and therefore, appointed franchisees in various part of India. The franchisees, however, failed to achieve their respective agreed sales-targets and therefore, violated the pact, which has a provision of paying compensation to petitioner.
The franchisee owners, however, posted certain objectionable, hateful, defamatory content against them on two Russian websites — www.consumercomplaint.in and www.complaintboard.in, instead of paying money.
The petitioner alleged these two websites were in fact creating confusion among citizens for propagating themselves as saviours of "consumer complaints" in India, defying the inbuilt legislative mechanism of "consumer forums" and receiving the "consumer related complaints". They also created virtual parallel mechanism that was derogatory and harmful in nature and was against "national interest".
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