The Madhya Pradesh High Court has directed its Registry to suspend the live-streaming of all benches hearing criminal matters until the next date of hearing in a pending Public Interest Litigation (PIL) which alleges misuse of live-streamed court proceedings. The court’s order is to be implemented from a specified upcoming date, and arises from concerns that recorded or streamed content from criminal benches is being manipulated into reels, memes, and short video clips, which in turn allegedly portray the legal fraternity in a derogatory or harmful manner.
The PIL, filed under the title Arihant Tiwari v. Union of India, argues that private entities are misusing live-streamed criminal proceedings by creating such derivative content and disseminating it, often in violation of the Live-Streaming and Recording Rules for Court Proceedings in Madhya Pradesh (2021), particularly Rule 11(b) which prohibits editing, morphing or illegal usage of court content. The petitioner contends that despite safeguards put in place under those Rules, reels and video clips continue to be made and uploaded on platforms like YouTube and social media, in a manner inconsistent with the Rules and disrespectful to the court process and legal professionals.
In response to those allegations, a division bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva and Justice Vinay Saraf granted the following directions: the Registry must forthwith stop live streaming of criminal benches, but ensure that an unrestricted Webex link remains on the court website so that any interested person may view the proceedings via Webex. At the same time, the Registry is to ensure that no recording facility be made available through the Webex link to anyone accessing the proceedings in that mode.
The Court’s order invokes a previous decision in Vijay Bajaj v. Union of India, in which the Court restrained individuals and entities from editing, morphing or illegally using the court’s live-streamed content under the same Rule 11(b). The petitioner in the current case relies heavily on that precedent to argue that existing protections have proven inadequate in preventing misuse.
The MP High Court has issued notice in the PIL so that the parties, including the Union of India, can respond. The case has been listed for the next hearing on another date, by which time the Registry must have implemented the suspension of live streaming for criminal benches per the Court’s direction.
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