Facebook files compliance report before court

Facebook India on Monday filed its compliance report before the Delhi court which had ordered it and 21 other websites to remove objectionable content from their websites. 

Google India also told the court that it has removed certain web pages from the Internet on which objections were raised by the petitioners.

Meanwhile, Facebook, Yahoo and Microsoft told the court that they have no role to play in the case and there is no cause of action against them in the matter.

Additional Civil Judge Praveen Singh also posed a query to the counsel appearing for petitioner Mufti Aijaz Arshad Qasmi, as to whether the blog service-providing companies can be made a party to the case for any content posted by the users on the blogs.

The court asked these social networking websites to file written statements in 15 days, and posted the next hearing on 1^st March.

The court had on 20^th December last year, in a ex-parte order issued summons to 22 social networking website asking them to remove “anti-religious” or “antisocial” content in the form of photographs, videos or text which might hurt religious sentiments.

It had on 24^th December set 6^th February as deadline for the websites for the same.

The court’s order had come amid a raging controversy over monitoring the content on Internet and of those websites depending on user generated contents, which arose after Union Telecommunications Minister Kapil Sibal had asked the social networking websites to “screen” the contents.

Out of 21 websites, Google India, Facebook India and Yahoo India have approached the high court for quashing of magisterial court’s summons to them.

The High Court will hear the arguments on the 14^th of this month.