Google, Meta Tell Delhi HC They Can Only Remove Kejriwal Court Videos On Valid Takedown Requests

The Delhi High Court has reserved further consideration of a petition seeking action against the unauthorised recording and circulation of videos from court proceedings involving former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

During the hearing, Google and Meta Platforms argued that they cannot proactively monitor or remove such content without specific legal directions, maintaining that they can only act upon receiving valid takedown requests or court orders.

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The public interest litigation (PIL), filed by advocate Vaibhav Singh, concerns the alleged unauthorised recording and circulation of footage from an April 13 hearing before Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma, during which Kejriwal had appeared in person seeking the judge's recusal from a case, reported LiveLaw.

The petition alleges that recording and sharing the proceedings violated the Delhi High Court's Electronic Evidence and Video Conferencing Rules and seeks contempt proceedings against several individuals, including Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh and certain journalists accused of circulating the footage.

Appearing before a division bench comprising Justices V. Kameswar Rao and Manmeet P.S. Arora, counsel representing Google and Meta, submitted that both companies had already disabled the specific URLs identified by the petitioner or directed by the court.

However, they argued that proactively detecting and blocking future uploads of the same content is neither practical nor legally required.

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“Therefore, liability, if any, that is to be fastened can only be against the publisher/uploader of the Contested Content and not against the Answering Respondent. The Contested Content is admittedly ‘third-party content' or ‘user-generated content' that is (i) neither created, (ii) nor owned, (iii) nor otherwise controlled by the Answering Respondent. The Answering Respondent merely operates the YouTube platform, where videos can be uploaded and accessed on the internet on an ‘as is' basis,” the affidavit stated, as per LiveLaw.

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