The defamation battle between newswire Asian News International (ANI) and free online encyclopedia Wikipedia restarted before a single-judge of the Delhi High Court on Friday..The High Court today issued notice to Wikimedia Foundation (owner of Wikipedia) on a fresh application moved by ANI for an interim injunction against alleged defamatory content on Wikipedia's page about ANI.Justice Jyoti Singh heard the case today and issued notice to Wikipedia before listing the matter for further hearing on July 7..When Wikimedia’s counsel Senior Advocate Akhil Sibal requested more time, Justice Singh asked who would face the consequence if ANI's claim is found to be true.Advocate Sidhant Kumar appeared for ANI. He submitted that Wikipedia, being an intermediary has no locus to contest the matter on merits..The matter has come up for interim relief before the single-judge of the High Court for the second time. In its suit, ANI has alleged that Wikipedia was allowing anonymous users to make defamatory edits on the page about ANI. The single-judge on April 2 ordered takedown of the alleged defamatory statements about ANI. A Division Bench of the High Court on April 8 decision upheld the single-judge order. This led to an appeal before the Supreme Court.The Supreme Court on April 17 set aside the order passed by the High Court and stated that the single-judge can decide the matter afresh. The apex court chose to set aside the High Court orders in light of the fact that they were too broadly worded and did not specify which of the statements about ANI should be removed."Such a broad interim relief is not capable of being specifically implemented. The reason is that there is no clarity on the issue on who will decide whether the contents are false, misleading and defamatory," it said.Therefore, the top court granted liberty to ANI to move the single-judge of Delhi High Court again for interim relief in its suit.ANI has now filed a fresh application for interim relief pursuant to the Supreme Court order..ANI's suit before the Court has alleged that Wikimedia Foundation allowed anonymous Wikipedia users to refer to the news agency as a "propaganda tool" for the present Central government. Since then, the page underwent a number of edits.The High Court had issued summons to Wikipedia on July 9, 2024 and ordered it to disclose information about three people who made the edits on ANI's Wikipedia page. The order was resisted by Wikipedia, which itself chose to serve notices on these users instead of disclosing their identity in public..Interestingly, the Supreme Court today set aside the Delhi High Court's direction to Wikimedia Foundation to take down the page titled 'Asian News International vs. Wikimedia Foundation' which gave details about the defamation suit file by ANI.The page in question documented the proceedings in the defamation case filed by ANI against Wikipedia in the Delhi High Court. The High Court had last year taken objection to the page and said the discussion about the Court's observations would amount to contempt of court.The apex court today allowed Wikipedia's appeal against the takedown order passed by High Court."We have no hesitation to hold that the direction issued by the High Court could not have been issued," the top court said.Pertinently, the Court said that it is not the job of the judiciary to tell media to delete or take down content, and that even sub-judice matters can be reported and discussed by public.
