BENGALURU COURT ORDERS BLOCKING CONGRESS' TWITTER

The commercial court in Bengaluru on Monday directed Twitter to temporarily block Twitter handles of the Indian National Congress (INC) and its mass movement, Bharat Jodo Yatra in a copyright infringement suit initiated by MRT Music (plaintiff) alleging that the handles illegally used sound records of film KGF-Chapter 2 [MRT Music vs Indian National Congress and Ors. The court ruled that prima facie materials established that if the alleged illegal use of sound records was encouraged, the plaintiff would suffer an irreparable injury and the same would also lead to encouraging piracy at large. "Plaintiff has specifically produced a CD showing the side-by-side file i.e., the original version of his copyrighted work with that of the illegally synchronized version. These prima facie materials available before this court at this stage establish that if the same is encouraged plaintiff who is in the business of acquiring cinematography films, songs, music albums etc., will be put to irreparable injury and further same leads to encouraging piracy at large," the Court stated.

In view of the above, the Court, via an order of ex-parte injunction, restrained the defendants from unauthorizedly and illegally using the copyrighted work owned by the plaintiff till the next date of hearing. It also directed Twitter to take down three links from its platform and further ordered it to block the Twitter handles of INC and Bharat Jodo Yatra. Counsel for MRT contended that since the respondents were illegally using their music and infringing their rights, it was necessary to appoint a Commissioner to inspect and conduct an electronic audit and to preserve the infringing material on INC's Twitter account and Bharat Jodo Yatra's Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook accounts. The Court agreed with the same and stated that the object of granting the injunction would stand defeated if a commissioner was not appointed. It, therefore, appointed an administrator of its computer section as a local commissioner to visit the defendants' accounts, conduct an electronic audit and preserve infringing materials available to prepare an inventory of the same.

"This court is convinced that the object of granting an injunction would be defeated by delay if the commissioner is not appointed to make the local inspection. Accordingly, Sri. S.N. Venkateshmurthy, District System Administrator of Computer Section, Commercial Court, Bengaluru is appointed as Local Commissioner to visit the defendants 1 to 3 websites, conduct an electronic audit and preserve the infringing materials available in the above social media and prepare an inventory of the same and store the same in this court’s system and separate CD," the order stated.