HYDERABAD: A Division Bench of Telangana High Court issued notices to the State and Central governments, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and TikTok officials concerned to respond to a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking ban on TikTok mobile app for circulation of videos that allegedly undermines the medical seriousness of deadly Coronavirus and encourages the Muslim community to not follow social distancing or other precautionary measures issued by the governments. 

The Bench, comprising Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice A Abhishek Reddy, passed this order recently through video conference in a taken up PIL based on a letter addressed to the Chief Justice by city-based advocate Ashok Ram Kumar, seeking directions to take steps to ban the app in public interest.

Besides TRAI, Secretaries to Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, Electronics, Information and Broadcasting, State Chief Secretary and Director General of Police, Tik Tok grievance officer and Bytedance (India) Technology Private Limited are named as the respondents. Ram Kumar said the mobile app contained videos which were against the provisions of the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, and they put healthy people’s lives in danger. One of the short duration videos shows Muslim community and says those who pray five times a day would not be effected by Covid-19.   These videos are laced with religious overtones fuelling rebellion by a against the government.  The Bench posted the matter to June 2 for hearing.

‘Videos are laced with religious overtones’
The mobile app Tik Tok contained videos which were against the provisions of the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, and they put healthy people’s lives in danger. One of the short duration videos shows Muslim community and says those who pray five times a day would not be effected by Covid-19.  These videos are laced with religious overtones fuelling rebellion by a community against the government