Apar GuptaLast week Medianama and Mint reported that following the injunction granted to Nirmal Baba which we wrote on here, the Delhi High Court has passed a similar ex-parte ad-interim injunction restraining certain defendants from publishing content alleged to be defamatory about Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and the Art of Living.
The Injunction has been passed in case for civil defamation titled as Vyakti Vikas Kendra,India Public vs Jitender Bagga. The other parties to the case include Google, since the content which was alleged to be defamatory is published on blogspot.com, which is a blogging platform owned by it.
The Order dated 09.05.2012 which granted the injunction again makes substantial reliance on the Terms of Service of Blogger and the Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011.
The is the second reported injunction which has relied substantially on the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidlines) Rules, 2011. Through repeated practice we may see a trickle down effect with the rules being reinforced through successive court decisions.
We have seen a similar pattern in John Doe Injunctions, where now virtually every major Bollywood release coincides with a john doe order and the blocking of file sharing websites.