Telangana High Court on Friday directed Twitter, the social networking forum, Cabinet Secretary and Union Home Secretary to file counter affidavits in a PIL petition seeking action against posting hateful content against Islam.
A bench of Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy said the rights of the three respondents to file counter affidavits would be forfeited if they fail to respond by August 20. The issues raised by lawyer Khaja Aijazuddin, who filed the PIL petition, would be decided ex parte if the respondents fail to file the counter affidavits.
The matter would be adjudicated on merits, the bench said. The court told Assistant Solicitor General of India N. Rajeshwar Rao to ensure Cabinet Secretary and Union Home Secretary filed their counter affidavits. The bench also told the ASG to ask the two top officials to ensure Twitter company filed the counter affidavit.
Mr. Aijazuddin said in the petition that Twitter remained a mute spectator despite objectionable content targeting Islam was being tweeted. He said the Central and State governments also failed to act against the persons posting the content and ensuring the hateful comments were taken off Twitter.
The Hyderabad police, representing the State government, filed a counter affidavit stating that they were pro-active in initiating criminal action against persons posting objectionable content online. Already, mails were sent to Twitter to take off all posts, tweets, pictures and video clips triggering hatred against particular religion, the affidavit stated.
The matter was posted to August 20 for next hearing.
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