BENGALURU: The Karnataka high court on Wednesday rejected a petition filed by Elon Musk’s X Corp challenging the Centre’s content takedown orders, ruling that no global platform can evade Indian law and that American free-speech principles cannot be “transplanted” into India’s constitutional framework.
Justice M Nagaprasanna described social media as “a modern amphitheatre of ideas” that cannot be allowed “anarchic freedom”, stressing that speech is subject to reasonable restrictions under Article 19(2) of the Constitution.
‘Liberty not a licence to lawlessness’
“Regulation is a must, more so in cases of offences against women, failing which the right to dignity as ordained in the Constitution gets railroaded,” the court said. “Unregulated speech under the guise of liberty becomes a licence to lawlessness.”
The court underlined that fundamental rights are conferred on citizens, not foreign corporations: “A petitioner who seeks sanctuary under its canopy must be a citizen of the nation, failing which its protective embrace can’t be invoked.”
Sahyog portal valid, not censorship
X had argued that its business rests on lawful information sharing and that the Centre’s Sahyog portal functioned as an unconstitutional censorship tool. The HC disagreed, calling the portal “an instrument of public good, conceived under Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act and Rule 3(b) of the 2021 Rules… a beacon of cooperation between citizens and the intermediary.”
The judge criticised X for complying with takedown laws in the US but resisting in India: “The same petitioner refuses to follow the same on the shores of this nation.”
2021 rules a new regime
Justice Nagaprasanna ruled that the 2015 Shreya Singhal judgment applied only to the 2011 IT rules and is now “confined to history.” The 2021 rules, he said, require their own interpretation.
‘No platform above the law’
The court concluded that regulated speech protects both liberty and order, “the twin pillars of democracy.” It warned: “No social media platform in the modern-day agora may even seem the semblance of exemption from the rigour of the discipline of the laws of the land. Every sovereign nation regulates it. India’s resolve likewise can’t be branded unlawful.”
The ruling also noted that even US free-speech jurisprudence has shifted since the landmark Reno v. ACLU (1997) verdict, undercutting X’s reliance on American standards.
