The Delhi High Court is likely to pronounce its verdict on April 22 on a petition filed by WhatsApp challenging a decision of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) calling for an investigation into its controversial new privacy policy.
Justice Navin Chawla had reserved verdict on April 13 after hearing the arguments by both the sides.
WhatsApp has contended that the CCI need not have ordered the probe since the issue of its privacy policy was before the Supreme Court. Social media giant Facebook, which owns the instant messaging app, also filed a similar petition challenging the competition watchdog's March 24 decision.
WhatsApp said the CCI jumped the gun and started the probe when this was not in fact a competition issue. The issue with respect to personal data of the users, and sharing of personalised data, was already before the Supreme Court.
CCI, on the other hand, said the probe order was made to gauge whether access to data would lead to abuse by WhatsApp of its dominant position. The commission said it was dealing with the instant messaging app’s new privacy policy that could lead to excessive collection of consumers’ data and the use and sharing of the data in anti competitive context.
The commission said it was not concerned with the privacy aspect of the issue, as the Supreme Court was already seized of it.