Delhi HC directs removal of sexually explicit video involving judicial officer
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday directed online platforms to take down a "sexually explicit" video of a judicial officer and a woman, if it has not been already removed pursuant to its earlier directions.
Justice Yashwant Varma closed the proceeding on a lawsuit filed by one of the aggrieved parties against the video's circulation on social media, and said the platforms will examine and take appropriate steps, if the plaintiff later points out the existence of the offending content.
The court had earlier directed that the identity of the aggrieved party be remained concealed.
The lawsuit had sought a permanent injunction restraining publication and telecast of the "purported video dated March 9, 2022" that surfaced online on November 29 that year.
On November 30 last year, the court had restrained sharing and posting of the video, and called for taking down the content from various online platforms.
The central government had, subsequently, informed that a "compliance affidavit" has been filed and action taken by the platforms, including Facebook and Twitter.
The plaintiff was represented by lawyer Ashish Dixit.
While passing the interim order, the court had said the circulation of the video was in violation of several laws and irreparable harm would be caused to the privacy rights of the plaintiff. Therefore, an ad interim ex-parte injunction was warranted, it had said.
The court had noted that the full court of the high court had itself taken cognisance of the incident on its administrative side and pursuant to a resolution, its registrar general had conveyed to authorities the need to take appropriate action for blocking of the video over all ISPs, messaging platforms as also social media platforms.
"Bearing in mind the sexually explicit nature of the contents of that video and taking into consideration the imminent, grave and irreparable harm that is likely to be caused to the privacy rights of the plaintiff an ad interim ex parte injunction is clearly warranted," the court had said in its order.
