Due to account blocking orders, Twitter claims its entire operation will shut down, K’taka HC notifies the Center

In relation to the decision from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology asking to block over 1,100 Twitter accounts, the Karnataka High Court on Tuesday sent a notice to the governing BJP administration at the Centre.

Senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi, representing Twitter, made arguments before the single division bench led by Justice Krishna S. Dixit, explaining that if the blocking order is upheld, Twitter’s entire operation will go down. According to the guidelines, the microblogging platform must be informed of the grounds for blocking the accounts, which is not being done.

He argued that account holders must answer to the petitioner (Twitter) for blocking their accounts.

The bench set the subject for hearing on August 25 and promised to take the central government’s attorney’s request for an in-camera hearing into consideration.

According to Twitter’s petition, blocking orders issued by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeiTY) under the IT Act show a disproportionate and unreasonable use of authority.

The microblogging service argued that MeiTY had filed a notification warning of dire repercussions for failure to comply with blocking orders. In addition to threatening legal action, the notice indicated that failure to follow instructions to block accounts will result in a missed opportunity.