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The Karnataka High Court was hearing X’s pleas challenging the Indian government’s ‘Sahyog’ portal, which is used for issuing content-blocking orders to intermediaries.
X Corp, formerly known as Twitter, expressed its opposition to come on board the Sahyog portal, which is managed by the home ministry’s Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (IC4). (Reuters/File)
The Karnataka High Court on Wednesday said regulation of social media handles is a must, saying that no platform should treat India as a market, and that unregulated speech under the guise of liberty results in lawlessness.
The court was hearing pleas by X (formerly Twitter) challenging the Indian government’s ‘Sahyog’ portal, which is used for issuing content-blocking orders to intermediaries. While X argued that it blocks free speech, the High Court said that X’s challenge was “without merit”.
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Justice M Nagaprasanna delivered the judgement, saying the Sahyog portal stands as a beacon of cooperation between the citizen and intermediary. It is a mechanism through which the state aims to control cybercrime, he said.
He further cited Article 19 (1) of the Constitution, which grants the right to speech and expression with reasonable restrictions. “Information and communication, its spread or speed has never been left unchecked and unregulated. It has always been a subject matter of regulation,” the court said.
“As and when the technology develops from messengers to postal aids till the age of WhatsApp, Instagram and Snapchat, all have been regulated by regulatory regimes subsisting then and subsisting today, both globally and locally,” the HC said. “American judicial thought cannot be transplanted into the soil of Indian Constitutional thought.”
About the Author
Aveek Banerjee is a Senior Sub Editor at News18. Based in Noida with a Master’s in Global Studies, Aveek has more than three years of experience in digital media and news curation, specialising in international…Read More
Aveek Banerjee is a Senior Sub Editor at News18. Based in Noida with a Master’s in Global Studies, Aveek has more than three years of experience in digital media and news curation, specialising in international… Read More
September 24, 2025, 21:53 IST
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