Ghaziabad 'assault' video | Karnataka High Court puts off ruling on Twitter MD's plea to July 20

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The Karnataka High Court will pronounce on July 20 its order on a plea filed by Twitter India managing director Manish Maheshwari challenging a notice asking him to appear before the Ghaziabad police.

On July 13, Justice G Narendar said he needed more time to go through the citations related to jurisdiction before dictating the order, adjourning the matter by a week.

What’s the case?

Twitter India was named as one of the accused in the case filed by the Ghaziabad police on June 15 for sharing a video of an assault on a 65-year-old person in the city.

The video, which emerged earlier that month, showed miscreants attacking a senior citizen, identified as Abdul Samad Saifi, and cutting off his beard. In another video, the elderly man claimed he was assaulted due to his religion.

A notice was sent to Maheshwari, asking him to appear before the police in Ghaziabad. He challenged the notice in the Karnataka High Court and was granted interim relief.

Maheshwari contested that one of the legal provisions under which he was booked, Section 41A, empowered police to arrest him on grounds that he didn’t cooperated with police, especially when he was just an employee and had no control over the content on the platform.

Maheshwari also said he was a resident and worked from Bengaluru, which was not under the jurisdiction of the Uttar Pradesh police. The notice sent to him to appear before the police was not authorised under the law.

It was also argued that Twitter India was not an intermediary and had no control over the content on the platform.

The Uttar Pradesh police denied the claims, saying if Maheshwari was Twitter India Managing Director and he would have to cooperate with the inquiry.

Government vs Twitter

Apart from this, the company has also been facing more complaints. On June 28, Maheshwari was named in another FIR since the Twitter site incorrectly showed Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh as a separate country. He was also booked under Indian Penal Code Section 505 (2), for public mischief and Section 74 of the Information Technology Act, which deals with publication for a fraudulent purpose.

These incidents come at a time when the US microblogging platform is at loggerheads with the government over compliance with the new IT rules that came into effect on May 26.

Earlier, the company’s interim grievance officer Dharmendra Chatur quit and the firm is yet to appoint chief compliance and nodal officer.

The firm has named US-based Vinay Prakash as the resident grievance officer and released the compliance report under the new IT rules recently.

India is one of the largest markets for Twitter with about 17.5 million users.