X Corp Appeals Against Karnataka HC Order Asking it to Pay Rs 50 Lakh Penalty
The Wire Staff
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New Delhi: Twitter’s parent company X Corp. has preferred an appeal against a Karnataka high court order asking the social media platform to pay Rs 50 lakh as penalty while dismissing its plea challenging the blocking orders issued to it by the Union government, LiveLaw reported.
On June 30, a single judge bench comprising Justice Krishna Dixit had dismissed X Corp.’s plea challenging blocking orders from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, the report said.
The court had also said that a fine of Rs 5,000 per day would be levied if the platform failed to pay the penalty amount within 45 days.
X Corp, in its appeal, called the penalty unjust and excessive and had sought stay on the penalty payment which is due on August 14, the report said.
“In case this court is unable to render a decision on Appellant's interim application prior to August 14, 2023, appellant requests that the daily levy of Rs.5,000, be kept in abeyance until this Hon'ble Court decides the interim application,” the appeal read.
The company in its appeal says that if the single bench decision is upheld, the Union government will be "emboldened" to issue more blocking orders.
According to a report in Moneycontrol, the micro-blogging platform asserted that the court was wrong in its assessment that X Corp. was not entitled to rights under Article 21 of the Constitution. Article 21 states that no person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty, except in accordance with the procedure established by law.
X Corp. was also of the view that the court “ignored” MeitY’s failure to comply with Rule 14 of the Blocking Rules (Information Technology Rules, 2009) which require a review committee meeting once in two months to assess whether all the directions comply with the section 69A of the IT Act and if not, then the orders are to be reversed.
The matter is likely to be heard next week, LiveLaw reported.
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