CRP No.78/2012 Page 1 of 13

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI

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C.R.P. No.78/2012 & C.M. No.7471/2013

FACEBOOK INDIA ONLINE SERVICES PVT LTD ..... Petitioner

Through

Mr.Prag Tripathi, Sr. Adv. with

Mr.Tejas Karia, Ms.Suman Kutreji,

Ms. Bahaar Dhawan & Mr.Nitish

Goel, Advs.

versus

MUFTY AIJAS ARSHAD QASMI

..... Respondent

Through

Mr.Shaildendra Singh, Adv. for R-1.

Mr.Akhil Anand, Adv. with

Mr.Praveen Sehraat, Adv. for R-3 to

6.

CORAM:

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE MANMOHAN SINGH

MANMOHAN SINGH, J. (Oral)

1.

By way of the present petition under Section 115 of CPC, the

petitioner has assailed the order dated 30^th May, 2012 whereby an

application under Order 1 Rule 10 CPC for deletion of its name from the

array of parties in a suit filed by the respondent No.1 was dismissed.

2.

Respondent No.1 filed a suit against the petitioner and other parties

who are the defendants in the main suit therein for permanent and

mandatory injunction seeking that the Defendants may be directed to

remove and permanently be restrained from posting alleged objectionable

content/materials that are purportedly damaging the Indian Culture and are

2013:DHC:4200

CRP No.78/2012 Page 2 of 13

hurting the sentiments of the religious communities. The respondent No.1

alleged to have filed the said suit being a responsible person of the society

in the public interest.

3.

An ex-parte order directing the defendants to remove the alleged

objectionable contents as claimed by the respondent No.1 to be available on

various social networking sites was passed when the matter came up for

hearing along with another direction to the defendants to file a compliance

affidavit.

4.

While the petitioner at the time of entering appearance in the suit

filed a compliance affidavit in terms of the said order, it also filed an

application for deletion of its name from the array of parties wherein it was

stated that the Petitioner was not responsible for hosting the content that

may appear on www.facebook.com or any website and that it does not

control the servers and host the website www.facebook.com which are

located in the US. On the same day, the learned trial court observed that the

Petitioner i.e. defendant No.1 therein and defendant No.2 were improperly

referred to as one and the same party i.e. Facebook in the cause title of the

suit, and accordingly, the Respondent No.1 was directed to rectify the

memo of parties.

5.

In its written statement, the petitioner contended that the petitioner

has been incorporated to carry on business in India and abroad of, inter alia,

online support services, software development, providing technical support

and services and that the petitioner does not own or operate any server that

hosts the alleged content. It was also contended that no cause of action had

been disclosed against the petitioner at all and as to the averments made in

2013:DHC:4200

CRP No.78/2012 Page 3 of 13

the plaint, no connection had been established between the petitioner and

the alleged content.

6.

On subsequent dates, Microsoft India Pvt. Ltd. (Defendant no. 7

therein) and Yahoo India Pvt. Ltd (Defendant no. 5 therein) respectively

filed applications for deletion of their names from the array of parties and

the same were allowed. It is contended by the petitioner that the application

by Yahoo India was on similar grounds as that of the petitioner’s however

the same relief to petitioner was denied without there being any evidence of

petitioner’s position being different to that of Yahoo India.

7.

Subsequently, the Respondent No.1 filed an application for deletion

of Defendants no. 4,6,8,10