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The Supreme Court was informed on Tuesday that the blocking order passed by the Central government against the YouTube channel ‘4PM News’ under the IT Rules, 2009, has been withdrawn.
Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for channel’s Editor-in-Chief Sanjay Sharma, apprised the Bench of Justice BR Gavai and Justice AG Masih that the channel has been unblocked.
When the Court observed that nothing survived in the matter, Sibal requested that the petition be kept alive by tagging it with the plea challenging the Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguards for Blocking for Access of Information by Public) Rules, 2009.
The top court of the country then observed that the petition survived for the academic purpose only.
On May 5, the Apex Court issued notice to the Union government, the Ministry of Home Affairs, and YouTube on Sharma’s petition, which challenged the blocking order, calling it arbitrary, unconstitutional, and a violation of his fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution.
During the last hearing, the Bench expressed its intention to tag Sharma’s petition with a similar plea challenging the 2009 Rules. However, Sibal sought an interim order against the blocking of the channel, after which the matter was listed today.
Sharma claimed that YouTube (an intermediary) blocked his channel without any prior notice or hearing, pursuant to an “undisclosed” order of the Union government under the 2009 Rules.
Challenging the vires of the IT Blocking Rules 2009, Sharma sought urgent restoration of access to his platform. He further sought directions to the Centre to produce the blocking order with reasons and records, if any, issued to YouTube for blocking the 4PM News channel.
The petitioner also prayed for quashing of the blocking order passed by the Central government, once the same was produced.
The petition demanded that Rule 16 of the 2009 Rules be quashed and/or the word ‘shall’ be read as a compulsory requirement. He also demanded that Rule 8 of the 2009 Rules be read down to ensure a conjunctive reading of the term “or” as “and”.
The plea sought directions to ensure that the blocking notice was issued to the intermediary as well as the person (originator or creator of the content).
The petitioner sought either the striking down or reading down of Rule 9 of the 2009 Rules to mandate the issuance of a notice, opportunity of hearing, and communication of a copy of the interim order to the person (originator or creator of the content), prior to the passing of a final order.
This article first appeared on India Legal
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