SC Issues Notice To Centre Over Plea Seeking Automatic Removal Of Hate Speech, Fake News On Facebook & Twitter

A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian issued notice to the Union Home Ministry while hearing the petition which urged the apex court to direct the Centre to establish a mechanism for automatic removal of hate speech and fake news within a short timeframe.

Supreme Court of India | File Image

The Supreme Court has issued notice to the Centre on a petition seeking directions to make laws to regulate social media platforms and to hold Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and WhatsApp responsible for spreading hate speech.

A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian issued notice to the Union Home Ministry while hearing the petition which urged the apex court to direct the Centre to establish a mechanism for automatic removal of hate speech and fake news within a short timeframe.

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According to the plea: “A registered account is sufficient to start a channel, which provides a platform of uploading videos in the social media such as Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, etc, which means anyone can float anything in the social media, there is no restriction or censor for their contents and there are no regulations at all by the government.”

The plea called for a curb on such speech through social media stating “social media’s reach is much wider than that of the traditional media.”

The plea also said, “freedom of expression is a complex right, this is because freedom of expression is not absolute and carries with it special duties and responsibilities”.

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“Freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1) of the Constitution goes hand-in-hand with reasonable restrictions that may be imposed under Article 19(2),” added the plea, which was filed before the apex court in the wake of two tweets allegedly using derogatory terms against Hindu goddesses.