High Court rejects Twitter plea against Indian government, slaps Rs 50 lakh on social media giant

The Karnataka High Court on Friday dismissed US social media giant Twitter’s plea challenging the Central government’s orders to block tweets and accounts and imposed a fine of Rs 50 lakh.

Twitter had moved the Karnataka High Court in July last year challenging the blocking orders of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, calling the orders arbitrary and against freedom of speech and expression.

The court ruled that Twitter was served notices, to which it did not comply, Deputy Minister for Information Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar said in a tweet.

The U.S.-based firm had last year asked the court to overturn some government orders to remove content from the social media platform.

This followed an order from the authorities to act on its content – including accounts supportive of an independent Sikh state, posts alleged to have spread misinformation about protests by farmers and tweets critical of the government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“So you have not given any reason why you delayed compliance, more than a year of delay… then all of sudden you comply and approach the court,” the bench said during the verdict on Friday, Chandrasekhar tweeted.