Courts have their rosters packed ahead of their summer vacations—we round up hearings worth looking out for before they close their doors.
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May 8th*: The Supreme Court may hear Tamil Nadu’s petition challenging the Madras High Court’s 2021 judgment striking down its ban on online gambling. Point to note: the state government passed another ban on online gambling in April that’s already been challenged again at the High Court. Case number: SLP (C) 19981-88/21.
May 9th: Aaradhya Bachchan’s Delhi High Court challenge against platforms hosting misinformation on her health will resume hearings. Fun fact: Bachchan is the granddaughter of Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan. Case number: CS (COMM) 230/2023.
May 12th*: The Supreme Court may hear the multiple challenges filed against India’s platform regulation rules, the IT Rules, 2021. In the meanwhile, the government has passed a couple of amendments to the rules despite the pending proceedings. Case number: TP (C) 1147-1152/2021.
May 12th: Tanul Thakur created a satirical website that did the hard work of calculating marriage dowries—the Indian government missed the joke, blocking the site across the country. Thakur’s challenge to the blocking will be heard by the Delhi High Court. As an aside: we asked the IT Ministry to give us information on the blocking order—it declined. Case number: WP (C) 788/2023.
May 16th: The Supreme Court will hear challenges against the Indian government’s decision to block a BBC documentary critical of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Filed by journalist and editor N. Ram, lawyer Prashant Bhushan, and politician Mahua Moitra, the case was last heard on April 4th, where a lot of administrative details were discussed. Case number: WP (C) 116/2023.
May 23rd: The Delhi High Court will continue hearing ed-tech company Made Easy’s challenge against Telegram’s alleged unauthorised hosting of copyrighted content. Case number: CS (COMM) 392/2021.
May 26th: The Delhi High Court will also hear trademark owners’ challenges against the misuse of their marks in domain names registered by “unauthorised persons”. Remember, the Court seemingly blocked access to five domain name registrars back in February. A month later, it observed that “repeated non-compliance with court orders could be considered to be a violation of public order”, which could be construed as a ground to block the platform under Section 69A of the IT Act, 2000. Case number: CS (COMM) 135/2022.
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Past hearing updates and upcoming dates
April 11th: The Supreme Court heard the challenge against WhatsApp’s allegedly invasive privacy policy of yore. During the hearing, the Indian government said that a new data protection bill would be tabled during the monsoon Parliament session, after which the Court ordered the case to be listed in the first week of August. Case number: SPL (C) 804/2017.
April 17th: The Karnataka High Court reserved orders in Twitter’s challenge against the Indian government’s blocking of 39 URLs. The Court reopens after summer vacation on May 20th. Case number: WP 13710/2022.
April 27th: The Bombay High Court heard comedian Kunal Kamra’s challenge against the Indian government’s plans to fact-check government-related news online. The government has until June 6th to file its response, while the case will be next heard on June 8th. WP (L) 9792/2023.
April 27th: The Madras High Court heard a challenge against the Tamil Nadu government’s recent ban on online gambling in the state. The Court refused an interim stay on the ban, granting the state government six weeks to file a counter affidavit. We have been unable to access the petition so far, this piece will be updated with the case number once we do.
May 1st: The Supreme Court heard the suo motu Prajwala case on the dissemination of child porn online—it’ll be next heard on July 10th. Case number: SMW (Crl) 3/2015.
May 2nd: The Delhi High Court heard a car seat manufacturer’s challenge against Flipkart for allegedly not taking action against infringing products sold on the platform. A copy of the order is unavailable—we’ll update this piece with the next hearing date once it is. Case number: CS (COMM) 63/2023.
*This date has been auto-generated by the Supreme Court of India and is subject to revision.
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Read more
- Court Watch: Which Tech Policy Cases Are India’s Courts Hearing This April?
- Court Watch: Tech Policy Cases India’s Courts Will Hear This March
- Court Watch: 12 Tech Policy Cases To Keep An Eye Out For This February
- Court Watch: The Biggest Indian Tech Policy Cases To Keep An Eye On In 2023
- Our coverage of tech policy at the Supreme Court, Delhi High Court, Madras High Court, Kerala High Court, and Karnataka High Court
