The Delhi High Court has ordered Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera, and Ragini Nayak to delete their social media posts wherein they claim that veteran journalist Rajat Sharma had used offensive language during his show on the day of the Lok Sabha election results.
Facts of the Case
The controversy began when Nayak accused Sharma of verbally abusing her on national television during a debate on the counting day of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Sharma’s lawyer highlighted that although the debate aired on the evening of June 4, when the election results were declared, the Congress leaders only started posting tweets about it on June 10 and 11. Senior advocate Maninder Singh, representing Sharma, argued that a manipulated clip of the show was being circulated with an inserted abusive remark, whereas the original footage did not contain any such language.
Court’s Order
Justice Neena Bansal Krishna stated that upon reviewing the footage of the TV debate presented in court, it was prima facie clear that plaintiff Sharma had only briefly intervened for a few seconds and had not used any abusive language against Nayak. The court emphasized that while public criticism and alleged defamatory posts, tweets, and YouTube videos on intermediary platforms face a higher threshold of scrutiny, individuals’ dignity and honor should not be tarnished under the guise of exercising free speech and expression. The posts criticizing the plaintiff are merely exaggerations and portrayals of facts that are blatantly untrue, the court held.
The court ordered that the posts or tweets referred to as “X,” which have not yet been removed, must be taken down by the defendants within seven days, in accordance with the Intermediary Guidelines. Additionally, it directed that videos currently accessible to the public must be made private and should not be made public again without further orders from the court.
