Not our duty to tell media what to delete, says Supreme Court

The Supreme Court, in a judgment, on Friday (May 9, 2025) held that it is not the duty of courts to instruct the media to delete or take down content.

The verdict by a Bench of Justices A.S. Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan came in a challenge to a Delhi High Court order directing the takedown or deletion of online content related to a defamation case between news agency, Asian News International, and Wikimedia Foundation and comments allegedly made by the Single Judge of the High Court hearing the dispute.

A Division Bench of the High Court had given Wikimedia 36 hours to take down the online pages hosted on its platform. The Division Bench order of October 16 last year prima facie decided that the content bordered on contempt and amounted to interference in court proceedings and violation of the sub-judice principle by a party to the defamation proceedings.