The WhatsApp group administrator will not be held criminally liable after an objectionable post by a different member of the group, the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court has held and quashed a case of sexual harassment lodged in opposition to a 33-year-old man.
The order was handed final month and a copy of it was made out there on April 22.
A Division Bench headed by Justice Z.A. Haq and A.B. Borkar famous that an administrator of a WhatsApp group has solely restricted powers of including or deleting members to the group and does not have the ability to control or censor the content material posted within the group.
The courtroom handed its order on an software filed by Kishor Tarone (33), the administrator of a WhatsApp group.
He was in search of to quash the case registered in opposition to him in Gondia district in 2016 underneath Sections 354-A(1)(iv) (making sexually colored remarks), 509 (insulting the modesty of a girl) and 107 (abetment) of the IPC and Section 67 (publishing or transmitting obscene materials in digital kind) of the Information Technology Act.
As per the prosecution, Mr. Tarone did not take motion in opposition to a member of his WhatsApp group who used filthy and indecent language in opposition to a girl member within the group.
It was alleged that the applicant, being the group administrator, did not take away or delete the member from the group and likewise did not requested him to apologise.
The Bench in its order stated the crux of the matter is whether or not an administrator of a WhatsApp group could be held criminally liable for objectionable posts made by a member of the group.
Noting the functioning of the messaging service app, the courtroom stated, “Group administrators, as they are generally called, are the ones who create the group by adding or deleting members. Every chat group has one or more administrators.” A group administrator has solely restricted energy of eradicating a member from the group or including different members to the group, it stated.
“Once the group is created, the functioning of the administrator and that of the members is at par with each other, except the power of adding or deleting members to the group,” the courtroom stated.
“The administrator of a WhatsApp group does not have the power to regulate, moderate or censor the content before it is posted on the group,” the HC stated.
But, if a member of the group posts any content material, which is actionable underneath regulation, such a individual could be held liable, the courtroom stated.
“In the absence of a special penal provision creating vicarious liability, an administrator of a WhatsApp group cannot be held liable for objectionable content posted by a member of a group unless it is shown that there was a common intention or pre-arranged plan,” the courtroom stated in its order.
The HC quashed and put aside the FIR lodged in opposition to Mr. Tarone and the next cost sheet filed in opposition to him.
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