Google lists Modi in 'top 10 criminals', gets court notice
The court has scheduled August 31 as the next date of hearing.
The Alllahabad district court has ordered a criminal case against US-based search engine giant Google for listing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s image among the search results for the ‘top 10 criminals of the world.’
According to the reports, a notice has been sent to Google’s CEO and the company’s head in India by the additional district judge (ADJ), Mahtab Ahmed.
The complaint was filed by an advocate, named Sushil Kumar Mishra, alleging that an image of Modi appears when one searches ‘top 10 criminals of the world’ on Google. He also claimed that he wrote a letter to Google, requesting them to take down the image, but never received any response from the company.
Earlier, Mishra had filed the complaint before the Civil Line police station in Allahabad saying Google had to remove it. When the police didn’t register the case he approached chief judicial magistrate (CJM). However, the CJM dismissed the application, saying it to be a civil matter. Thus, he later challenged the CJM’s order by filing a revision application to the ADJ, who accepted the revision application and issued a notice to the company.
However, last year in June, Google had apologised for the search result, and assured that the company is working to improve its search related algorithm to prevent unexpected results like this.
The company said that these results trouble them and are not reflective of the opinions of Google.
Sometimes, the way images are described on the internet can yield surprising results to specific queries, Google added.
The court has scheduled August 31 as the next date of hearing.