HC stops US portal from posting content against Indian 'baba'

The Delhi high court has restrained a US-based website from posting any material on its webpagess that is defamatory to spiritual guru Nirmal baba.

The Delhi high court has restrained a US-based website from posting any material on its webpagess that is defamatory to spiritual guru Nirmal baba.

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Justice Manmohan Singh in his interim order directed the portal, www.hubpages.com, not to publish any material on its site which is harmful to the reputation of Nirmaljit Singh Narula also known as 'Nirmal baba'.

"It appears that the plaintiff (Nirmal baba) has been able to make out a strong prima facie case of passing of interim order. The balance of convenience also lies in favour of the plaintiff and against the defendants..(hubpages). In case interim order is not passed, he will suffer irreparable loss and injury.

"Till the next date, the defendants...are restrained from selling, leasing, licensing, writing, publishing, hosting, advertising, any content, existing or future, that is defamatory about the plaintiff...," the court said.

The direction of the court came on the plea of Narula, who claims to offer spiritual guidance to lakhs of followers.

He alleged that the website hubpages.com and author 'indijobs' deliberately posted defamatory articles about him on the portal with the intent of causing serious damage to his reputation.

Narula said that the article on him on the website contained false statements that he is "a suspicious guru" and that he uses 'Vashikaran mantra' that is black magic.

Earlier, Narula had served a notice to the website asking it to remove the defamatory material from its webpages. However, the portal refused to remove the content saying it was merely publishing a different opinion about a public figure.