Two weeks after a litigant’s unruly conduct went viral on social media, the Supreme Court on Friday banned posting, reposting or uploading of audio-video recordings of court proceedings on social media and other digital platforms without prior permission of the court concerned.
“As an interim measure, it is directed that there shall be no extraction, modification, dissemination… posting, reposting and uploading of audio-video visual recordings of judicial proceedings on social media or other digital platforms without prior permission of the Secretary General of this court or the Registrar General of the jurisdictional high courts,” a Bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant said.
"Courts cannot be a 24×7 entertainment channel…this is trivialising justice,” Justice Bagchi said during the hearing.
The Bench – which also included Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V Mohana – however, clarified that the interim direction would not affect news reporting of court proceedings.
The top court asked the Centre and social media intermediaries, including Meta and X and others, to spell out their respective stand on the misuse of live-streaming and circulation of videos of court proceedings on social media. It directed the Union Government to place before the Court a proposal identifying the nodal ministries that could implement the reliefs sought in the petition.
The Bench asked all the 25 high courts to submit reports on the adoption of the Supreme Court's livestreaming guidelines with their views on the impact of continuous livestreaming of court proceedings.
In an ugly turn of events, a litigant was forcibly removed from the Supreme Court on July 10 after he hurled abuses and threw his case file during the hearing of his petition challenging an Allahabad High Court order.
Litigant Prabal Pratap Singh and his associate Chander Bhan, both law students, were later arrested and sent to judicial custody.
On July 15, the Supreme Court decided to ask petitioners-in-person to appear virtually and stop live-streaming of proceedings if they insisted on appearing physically.
The order came on journalist Harshita Grover’s PIL seeking guidelines to regulate the clipping, editing, dissemination and monetisation of audio-visual recordings of court proceedings on digital platforms.
Courts can’t be a 24x7 entertainment channel
Courts cannot be a 24X7 entertainment channel…this is trivialising justice. There’s a need to ensure that sanctity of the institution is maintained. Supreme Court
Selective and decontextualized circulation of courtroom exchanges undermined the dignity of courts and eroded public confidence in the justice delivery system, the PIL submitted.
While live-streaming and video conferencing of court proceedings were introduced to advance the principles of open justice and transparency, the absence of a regulatory framework has enabled widespread misuse of such recordings for sensationalism, misinformation and commercial gain, the petitioner contended.
Maintaining that he had no objection to live streaming of court proceedings, senior counsel Vikas Singh, representing the petitioner, expressed serious concern over the misuse of edited clips of court hearings circulating on social media.
He specifically talked about a video clip of the recent unruly behaviour of a litigant before the Bench led by Justice Viswanathan that went viral, making the judiciary a joke before the common man.
Highlighting the dangers posed by artificial intelligence, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta warned that edited courtroom videos could be manipulated to alter the words spoken by judges and lawyers while retaining authentic lip movements.
He said clips from the livestream were selectively extracted and distorted to create a particular narrative.
The CJI said even in the print media, some of his comments were distorted.