A Public Interest Litigation being Writ Petition (Civil) No.
177/2013 ‘Kamlesh Vaswani vs Union of India and others’ pending in the Supreme
Court of India came up for hearing on 29th August 2014 before the Bench of
Chief Justice R.M.Lodha, Justice Kurian Joseph and Justice R.F.Nariman. This
petition demands ban on child pornography and blocking of adult porn sites in
India. The petitioner has stated that crimes against women are fuelled by
porn, and referred to the fatal gang-rape of a Delhi student on a moving bus in
Delhi in December 2012. The accused had allegedly watched porn on their
cellphones before the horrific assault. The petition states that the sexual
content that kids are accessing today is far more graphic, violent, brutal,
deviant and destructive and has put entire society in danger and also poses
threat to public order in India.
The Government told the Court that servers used to provide porn are located
abroad, making it hard to exercise any degree of control over them, however a committee
has been formed to deal with the problem. The Bench remarked that Law,
technology and governance have to be synthesised to control pornographic
materials on the Internet and adjourned the matter to 17th October 2014 to have
an update from the Committee.
Earlier, on 12.7.2013, the Court had observed that issue involved in this case
is of great consequence, as far as the citizens, and, in particular, the
children between the age groups of 14 to 18 are concerned. The Court hoped that
all the parties, including the Union of India, will treat the matter with all
seriousness and take positive steps to try and contain the menace. In January 2014,
the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) told the Supreme Court that it is
practically and technically impossible for them to block pornographic sites
without orders from the court and government and they cannot be made liable for
objectionable contents of the sites. On 21st April 2014, the Court directed The
Secretary, Department of Telecommunication (DoT) to file his personal affidavit
within one week on the issue whether the DoT or any other department of the Government
of India is competent to issue direction to the respondent No.4 (ISPs) to call
off sites showing pornography. The matter will now come up on 17th October
2014.
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