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The Delhi High Court Thursday waived off the Rs 25,000 cost it imposed on former CBI interim director and retired IPS officer M. Nageswara Rao in May while dismissing his petition against Twitter’s decision to withdraw the verification badge from his account.
Rao, whose account’s blue tick was allegedly removed in March, tendered an unconditional apology before the court. His counsel submitted that his petition had crossed “the line of reasonableness” and it should not have been filed. “I was just asking for his identity to be secured, I am not at all on [the] merits. My only grievance is that I am a pensioner,” Rao’s counsel submitted on his behalf.
Justice Yashwant Varma said, “Bearing in mind the unconditional apology which is tendered on behalf of the petitioner, the cost in terms of the order of 17 May 2022 shall stand deleted.”
After Rao had filed a second petition related to his Twitter account, Justice Varma in the order on May 17 had said there was “absolutely no justification” which warranted filing of the petition when a similar plea was disposed of by the court on April 7. Dismissing the second petition, the court had said, “The instant writ petition is thoroughly misconceived and is dismissed with costs quantified at Rs. 25,000”.
Seeking restoration of the verification badge on Twitter, Rao in his second petition argued that the action of Twitter is violative of various provisions of the constitution “as it is an impairment of the right to free speech”
“The petitioner in compliance of this Hon’ble Court’s aforesaid order reapplied for the Verification Tag. However, as expected, [Twitter] has not reinstated the Verification Tag (blue tick) attached to his Twitter handle to date,” Rao’s counsel had said in the petition.
In April after hearing his first petition, the court had granted Rao the liberty to reapply for the verification. In the order, Justice Varma had said, “The respondents must be accorded a reasonable period of time to evaluate the representation made. The Court finds that neither can the respondent [Twitter] be held to have caused inordinate delay in deciding the representation nor can it be said that serious prejudice or irreparable harm has been caused to the writ petitioner and which may have warranted the filing of the present writ petition.”
In his petition, Rao argued Twitter performs “a public function” and qualifies as ‘State’ for the purposes of Article 12 of the Constitution of India. Writs can be issued to it under Article 226 of the Constitution, he had contended.
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