Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener and former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
| Photo Credit: File photo
Google and Meta have informed the Delhi High Court that they cannot proactively monitor and act against the unauthorised publication and dissemination of clips of court hearing on former chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea seeking recusal of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma in the liquor policy case.
Google, which runs YouTube, and Meta, which runs Facebook and Instagram, filed their affidavits in a petition by lawyer Vaibhav Singh against the unauthorised recording and sharing of the court proceedings.
Mr Singh, in his plea also sought contempt action against AAP leaders, Mr Kejriwal, Mr Manish Sisodia, Mr Sanjay Singh, and others for allegedly uploading and sharing the clips in violation of the high court rules.
On Monday, a bench of Justice V Kameswar Rao and Justice Manmeet P.S. Arora deferred hearing on the petition till August 27, as Mr Kejriwal, Mr Sisodia and other politicians were yet to be served.
Meta, in its affidavit, stated that it was “impracticable (if not impossible) for Meta to locate or identify the Contested Content allegedly posted on the Facebook Service or Instagram Service without URLs”. It said every day, billions of pieces of content are posted and shared on Facebook Service and the Instagram Service.
Meta said it will take appropriate action in relation to specific URLs identified by the Petitioner or directed to be actioned by the court. However, the broader relief sought by the Mr Singh requiring Meta to “proactively identify and prevent the dissemination of any future content that may allegedly violate the VC (video conferencing) Rules (of Delhi HC)” falls outside the scope of the due diligence obligations contemplated under the IT Rules, it said.
“Compelling an intermediary to undertake such an exercise would require it to independently adjudicate the lawfulness of content and effectively become a “super censor”,” Meta’s affidavit said.
Google too stated in its affidavit that its video sharing platform “YouTube is a dynamic platform where millions of videos are uploaded every hour throughout the world”.
“Therefore, it is impossible for the Answering Respondent (Google) to proactively monitor the videos uploaded on the YouTube platform and have any specific knowledge of the contents of each such video or be able to sift through millions of videos to determine which of them contain the subject proceedings, to what extent or in what manner as to be violative of the applicable law,” Google said.
“Being an “intermediary”, the Answering Respondent (Google) by its very nature can neither be expected to nor is required in law to act as an arbiter of third-party claims on its website/platform on receipt of private notice, or actively monitor or filter the content uploaded by third-party users on its website/platform,” it added.
On April 23, the court had said that unauthorized recording, uploading and publishing of court hearings was prohibited under the high court rules, and sought the social media platforms’ stand on ensuring the removal of the clips of the court hearing.
The petition has claimed that several AAP leaders and members of various other opposition parties, including Congress leader Digvijay Singh, “intentionally and deliberately recorded and circulated” videos of Mr Kejriwal’s appearance before Justice Sharma on April 13 on social media with the intention to malign the image of the court in the eyes of the public.
Published – July 07, 2026 12:49 am IST
