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Informist, Tuesday, Mar. 10, 2026

 

NEW DELHI – A division bench of the Karnataka High Court Tuesday issued notice to the Centre on US-based technology and social media company X Corp.'s plea challenging a single judge's order in 2025 upholding the government's content blocking order under Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act, 2000. X has also challenged the single judge's ruling upholding the legality of the government's Sahyog portal, an online platform used to issue content take-down orders to intermediaries.

 

The social media company said it was "deeply concerned" by the single judge's order, which "will allow millions of police officers to issue arbitrary takedown orders" through a secretive online portal called Sahyog. This new regime has no basis in law, circumvents Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, violates previous Supreme Court rulings, and infringes upon Indian citizens' constitutional rights to freedom of speech and expression, it said. The Sahyog portal enables officers to order removal of content based solely on allegations of "illegality" without judicial review or due process for the speakers and threatens platforms with criminal liability for non-compliance, it said.

 

"X respects and complies with Indian law, but this order fails to address the core constitutional issues in our challenge and is inconsistent with the Bombay High Court's recent ruling that a similar regime was unconstitutional," the company, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, said. "We respectfully disagree with the view that we have no right to raise these concerns because of our incorporation abroad--X contributes significantly to public discourse in India and the voice of our users is at the heart of our platform," the petitioner said.

 

X has sought a declaration that Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act does not give the Centre the authority to issue information blocking orders. It has sought a court declaration that the blocking orders can only be issued under Section 69A of the Act, read with the Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguards for Blocking for Access of Information by Public) Rules, 2009.

 

Section 69A of the 2000 Act grants the government direct power to block online content under specific conditions and procedural safeguards while Section 79(3)(b) is an intermediary liability provision that, by negating safe harbour provisions, forces intermediaries to remove unlawful content upon official notification. This provision has been used to bypass the safeguards of Section 69A, according to the company. The core difference is that Section 69A is an order-making power for blocking, whereas Section 79(3)(b) is a liability provision for intermediaries which, when invoked for removal, can be seen as an indirect blocking mechanism.

 

The company has argued that the Centre's Sahyog portal enables blocking orders to be issued under Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act, thereby circumventing the due process mandated under Section 69A. It has argued that the portal has no statutory basis and bypasses procedural safeguards laid down by the Supreme Court in its judgment in 2015 in Shreya Singhal versus Union of India.  End

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Rajeev Pai

 

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