In order to prevent misuse of videos of court hearings, the Supreme Court on Friday passed an interim order prohibiting the unauthorised use or circulation of live-streamed court proceedings on social media and other digital platforms without prior permission. It clarified that the order will not affect news reporting.
A Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana passed the order while considering a plea seeking restraint on the unauthorised extraction and monetisation of videos of court proceedings.
"As an interim measure, we direct that there shall be no posting, reposting, extraction, modification, dissemination, monetisation, recording or review of the live-streamed proceedings of this Court on social media or any other digital platform without the prior permission of the concerned Registrar and the Secretary General of this Court and Registrar General of High Courts. The Secretary General of the Supreme Court and Registrar General of High Courts shall display this order on their court websites. This order shall have no bearing on news reporting," the order stated.
The Court also issued notice on the plea to all States and sought their responses. The Central government was asked to examine whether the prayers made in the plea can be implemented.The Bench also sought a report from the High Courts on the adoption of rules to regulate the live-streaming of courtroom hearings."They shall also give a report on the aspect of continuous live streaming of proceedings," the top court added in its order.
Justice Mohana clarified that the interim order passed today is not meant to be a gag on news reports."This is not a gag order on the press," she said.Earlier in the hearing, the Bench had expressed that it is not feasible or fair to expect all courtrooms to live-stream court hearings for all times to come. This was after a counsel flagged the manner in which recordings of court proceedings were being circulated on social media.
"Adding words and showing clips is also happening," observed Senior Advocate Vikas Singh today, representing the petitioner.The Bench, in turn, noted that a case had recently come up before the Delhi High Court over the circulation of unauthorised courtroom videos. In response, online intermediaries had told the High Court that they cannot proactively monitor or prevent such content.
"I don't think it is fair to expect livestreamings of all courts for all times to come," Justice Bagchi went on to observe.The judge said that it is difficult to manage the circulation of such live-streams once they are uploaded on the public domain. He expressed that courtroom hearings cannot be reduced to entertainment that belittles the justice system.
"All this data that goes into public forum.. This is the biggest challenge, to manage the data. Don't make live-streaming an option, but an exception. There cannot be 24x7 courtroom entertainment. That belittles the justice system," he said."All these incidents are forcing us to rethink," added CJI Kant.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta joined in expressing concerns about the circulation of courtroom videos without context. "A portion of livestreaming is taken up, colour is given to it and those who watch it are not even aware of what is happening and why," he said.Justice Bagchi suggested that court proceedings could continue to be recorded, but access to it could be restricted.SG Mehta added that Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools are also being used to modify the content of courtroom recordings when they are circulated.
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