* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI Date of decision: 2^nd APRIL, 2025 IN THE MATTER OF:

+ CS(OS) 524/2024 ANI MEDIA PVT. LTD. .....Plaintiff Through: Mr. Sidhant Kumar, Mr. Om Batra, Mr. Akshit Mago and Ms. Anshika Saxena, Advocates versus WIKIMEDIA FOUNDATION INC & ORS ......Defendants Through: Mr. Jayant Mehta, Sr. Advocate with Ms. Tine Abraham, Mr. Nikhil Narendran, Mr. Vijayendra Pratap Singh, Mr. Abhijnan Jha, Ms. Shivani Rawat, Mr. Thomas J. Vallianeth, Mr. Aayush Marwah, Ms. Shubhangni Jain, Mr. Abhi Udai Singh Gautam, Mr. Bakhshind Singh, Mr. Pranav Tomar, Ms. Jasleen Virk, Ms. Diva Saigal, Advocates for Defendant No.1 CORAM:

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SUBRAMONIUM PRASAD

JUDGMENT

I.A. 32611/2024

1. The present Application has been filed by the Plaintiff under Order XXXIX Rule 1 & 2 against the Defendants seeking the following prayers -

a. Pass an order against the Defendants, restraining them from posting, publishing, uploading, writing, speaking, distributing and/ or republishing any false, misleading and defamatory content against the Plaintiff on any Signature Not Verified Digitally Signed CS(OS) 524/2024 Page 1 of 61 platform, including the Platform maintained by Defendant No. 1;

b. Pass an injunction against the Defendant No. 1 or its agents or any person acting on its behalf of or under its authority, directing it to remove all false, misleading and defamatory content against the Plaintiff available on its Platform which can tarnish the reputation of the Plaintiff and further restrain its users and administrators from publishing anything defamatory against the Plaintiff on its Platform;

c. Pass an order directing the Defendant No. 1, or its agents or any person acting on its behalf of or under its authority, to remove the protection status imposed on the ANI Page;

d. Pass an order directing the Defendant No. 1 to disclose the identity of the Defendant Nos. 2 to 4, by providing their name, contact and other relevant details; and e. Pass any such other and further orders as this Hon'ble Court deems fit.

2. The Plaintiff is India's leading multimedia news agency providing syndicated news feed with over one hundred bureaus across the globe under the name "Asian News International" and "ANI". The Plaintiff has been managing and operating this business for over five decades, since the year

1971.

3. The Defendant No. 1 is a non-profit and charitable organisation incorporated under the laws of the United States of America. It is stated that the Defendant No. 1 has been set up to provide the necessary infrastructure to make knowledge available to the public free of charge. Defendant No. 1 Signature Not Verified Digitally Signed CS(OS) 524/2024 Page 2 of 61 hosts the English Wikipedia (hereinafter referred to as "Platform"), stated to be a free encyclopedia that currently contains over 6.8 million articles online in the English language.

4. The Defendants No. 2 to 4 are stated to be administrators of Defendant No. 1's Platform. It is stated that the administrators are vested with specialised rights and editing tools and can edit, block/unblock articles and pages on Wikipedia.

5. Shorn of unnecessary details, the facts in brief leading to the present application are as under:

i. In the year 2006, a page pertaining to the Plaintiff was created on the Platform of Defendant No. 1. It is stated that the framework of the Platform is as such that any user can edit the Plaintiff's page.

ii. It is stated that when the page was launched, it contained comments about the Plaintiff which was sourced through trusted websites. It is stated that this position continued up till 26.02.2019, and according to the Plaintiff, the said page encompassed neutral information about the Plaintiff. The Plaintiff's page as on 26.02.2019 is reproduced and reads as under-

Signature Not Verified Digitally Signed CS(OS) 524/2024 Page 3 of 61 iii. It is stated that thereafter, the Defendants No. 2 to 4 edited the page pertaining to the Plaintiff to include allegedly false,