‘Illegal activity in the name of being an intermediary.’
By Sreekanth A. Nair
The Supreme Court of India, on Tuesday, slammed Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft for publishing the advertisements of pre-natal sex determination services on their search engines.
A Bench of Justice Dipak Misra and R. Banumathi also ordered the central government to convene a meeting of technical experts, representatives of the companies, and the petitioner to sort out the issue, reported The Hindustan Times.
“Can these search engines continue to violate the law? Is there nothing that can be done to completely stop them? Google, Microsoft, Yahoo can’t continue doing the illegal activity in the name of being an intermediary,” asked the court.
The issue was raised before the court by Sabu Mathew George through a Public Interest Litigation (PIL). He requested the court to intervene in the issue to ban the advertisements and links offering sex-determination kits, tools, and clinics.
“They are violating the Indian law and are saying that they cannot do anything. It is not acceptable and this needs to be controlled. They can’t put anything which is against the law of the country,” the Bench said.
According to the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, 1994, sex determination has been banned in India. The intention of the law is to prevent female feticides and control the declining sex ratio in the country.
The search engines argued that they did not advertise anything that violates existing laws in India. But they cannot block articles and research reports as the ban is applicable only on advertisements.
The court will continue hearing on the issue on July 25.