A division bench of the Karnataka High Court on Thursday stayed the order of a single judge bench which imposed a fine of Rs 50 lakh on X Corp (formerly Twitter). However, the court has ordered the company to deposit half of the fine (i.e. Rs 25 lakh) within seven days. Earlier, the matter was heard on June 30. The single judge bench, in its judgment dated June 30, had also imposed a fine on the company. The company was ordered to make the payment to the State Legal Services Authority within 45 days.
A division bench of Chief Justice Prasanna B Varale and Justice MGS Kamal on Thursday heard the micro-blogging site's plea against Justice Krishna S Dixit's order. The bench, in its interim order, directed X Corp to deposit Rs 25 lakh within a week.
The court, however, said that depositing the money "cannot be treated as an admission by this court that the case is in favor of the appellant". Explain that on June 30, a bench of Justice Krishna S Dixit dismissed Twitter's petition challenging the blocking order of tweets (posts), URLs and hashtags given by the government.
The single judge had held that the company did not comply with the orders of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) for more than a year and then filed a petition in the High Court against those orders. Explain that between February 2, 2021 and February 28, 2022, the central government had asked the microblogging site to block 1,474 accounts, 175 tweets, 256 URLs and one hashtag in its 10 orders.
(pc amarujala)
