X (formerly Twitter) complies with takedown laws globally but seeks special treatment in India, the Union government told the Karnataka high court on Tuesday while opposing the social media giant’s petition against joining the Sahyog portal for automated notices.
Solicitor general Tushar Mehta, appearing for the government, said X must join the platform and comply with all takedown notices issued by designated authorities. “In every other country, they follow the law. Only in India, they expect these luxuries,” Mehta said.
X has challenged the government’s direction, asking it to join the portal, arguing that Sahyog opens the door for “indiscriminate censorship.”
Senior advocate KG Raghavan, who appeared for the company, cited the case of the Indian Railways asking X to remove a viral video of a woman driving on railway tracks in Telangana. Raghavan questioned how such content was unlawful. He claimed “every Tom, Dick, and Harry” could issue takedown notices under Sahyog.
Mehta objected to Raghavan’s choice of words and said the officers sending such notices were the competent authority, and the government would not tolerate anyone calling them names.
Justice M Nagaprasanna, hearing the matter, said the senior counsel must exercise restraint for these were officers of the “government of India” and had “statutory powers.”
{{/usCountry}}Justice M Nagaprasanna, hearing the matter, said the senior counsel must exercise restraint for these were officers of the “government of India” and had “statutory powers.”
{{/usCountry}}The government reiterated that X has no legal right to challenge takedown orders. It previously told the court in an affidavit that social media intermediaries did not have the locus to fight for their users in court. The government also cautioned that if X resisted, it might lose safe harbour.
Under Section 79 of the Information Technology (IT) Act, platforms like X are protected from liability for user content, provided they comply with takedown requests within 36 hours of receiving official notice.
X has argued that this provision has been misused to create a parallel blocking mechanism that violates the Supreme Court’s judgment in the case of Shreya Singhal vs Union of India, which provides for orders for content removal only under a defined process established under the IT Act.
The high court will hear the matter next on July 8.