All 21 websites, including Google and Facebook, summoned earlier by a magisterial court, are liable to face prosecution for being privy to the hosting of inflammatory contents on their webpages, the Delhi high court was told on Thursday.
The counsel for one Vinay Rai, who had moved the trial court for prosecution of various websites, including social networking sites and web search engines, argued before a bench of Justice Suresh Kait that the websites were knowing about contents of their webpages and they cannot shun their criminal liability in the act.
Opposing Google's plea, Rai's counsel Hariharan said the United States-based Google Inc and Google India are same and they had the knowledge of the contents because of their means and mechanism to monitor their web pages.
They cannot seek protection under the Information Technology Act, he said.
"Protection under section 79 of the IT Act is not available to them as they are doing more than just providing space for posting the material," the counsel said.
"Google Inc has knowledge of existing objectionable material on its webpages and has also the means to check them," he said adding "the foreign company works on the contents and makes advertisement on it."
Arguing that the websites generate revenue through the advertisement on its cyber space, the lawyer submitted the websites cannot shun their liabilities.
"They are generating revenue by providing space and posting advertisements on it...," the counsel said.
