Thursday, July 2, 2009

HC seeks info website

By S A Ishaqui

Hyderabad,July 1: The AP High Court on Wednesday took serious note of a US-based website that is allegedly spreading a hate campaign against the Congress leaders including the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh. The court asked the counsel for the home department to inform the action initiated by the cyber crime authorities on a complaint lodged by Mr Immaneni Rama Rao, an advocate.

A division bench while dealing with a petition challenging the inaction of cyber crime authorities issued notices to the Centre and the state governments asking them to explain their stand. The court asked the advocate to serve notices personally to the central IT secretary, its computer emergency response team, principal secretary of the home department and assistant commissioner of police, cyber crime wing.

The petitioner told the court that he was a member of Scribd, a social publishing network in the US. He said he came across certain articles in the network which offended the sentiments of the citizens by spreading hate messages against several leaders. All the articles contain bad things about Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Dr Manmohan Singh, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, Mr Rahul Gandhi and Union ministers Mr P. Chidambaram, Mr Pranab Mukherjee and the Chief Minister and Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, he added.

Mr Rama Rao said he complained about the content to the company and it replied saying public figures cannot be afforded protection against libel and slander. The bench asked the respondents to file their replies within two weeks.

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