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posted by: Kavya Mishra
Last updated: July 21, 2023, 2:40 PM IST
Bombay High Court. Image/PTI)
Attorney General Tushar Mehta sought bench justices Gautam Patel and Neela Gokhale to postpone earlier court appointments for the center to present his arguments justifying the rules
The center on Friday notified the Bombay High Court that it would not notify until September 4 the ‘Fact Checking Unit’ (FCU) under the recently amended IT rules for reporting fake content on social media against the government.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta sought panel judges Gautam Patel and Neela Gokhale to postpone earlier court appointments for the center to present its arguments justifying the rules.
The court was hearing a set of petitions challenging the amended IT rules. Stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra, the Editors Guild of India, and the Indian Magazine Association have petitioned in HC against the rules, calling them arbitrary and unconstitutional, and claiming they would have a chilling effect on the basic rights of citizens.
The petitioners’ advocates completed their arguments, after which the court posted the order on 27 and 28 July for Mehta to argue.
On Friday, Mehta asked the court to publish the case at the end of August.
“The difficulty I am facing is that the constitutional panel of the Supreme Court will start hearing arguments in matters related to Article 370 (which gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir) from August 2. I need to make some preparations for that,” said Mehta.
The court granted the motions and posted motions for hearings on August 31 and September 1.
Mehta said the statement issued by the Confederation government on not notifying the CAF will continue until September 4.
In April of this year, after the petitions were filed, the center told the court that it would not notify FCU until July. This month, the statement was extended from time to time when the court began hearing arguments in the petitions.
On April 6 this year, the Union Government issued some amendments to the IT Rules (Intermediate Guidelines and Code of Digital Media Ethics) 2021, including a requirement for a fact-checking unit to report fake, false or misleading content online related to the government.
The three petitions sought the court to declare the amended rules unconstitutional and direct the government to refrain from acting against any individual under the rules.
(This story was not edited by the News18 staff and was published from a syndicated news agency feed – PTI)
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