Elon Musk's X to appeal Karnataka HC order upholding govt’s content takedown portal 'Sahyog'

Elon Musk’s social media platform X said it will appeal a Karnataka High Court order that dismissed its challenge to the Indian government’s new “Sahyog” portal, a system which enables police officers to issue content removal requests without judicial oversight.

The court on Wednesday upheld the validity of the portal, which was launched in 2024 by the Union Home Ministry to expedite takedown requests through the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre.

Justice M. Nagaprasanna said social media “cannot be left in a state of anarchic freedom,” adding that platforms must accept regulation to protect rights such as dignity, particularly in cases of offences against women.

“The Sahyog Portal, far from being constitutional anathema, in its truth is an instrument of public good,” the order said, rejecting X Corp’s argument that the mechanism bypasses due process and violates Supreme Court's landmark 2015 ruling in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India.

The top court had ruled that content can only be restricted through a judicial process or the defined procedure under Section 69A.

Justice Nagaprasanna, however, said the Shreya Singhal case referred to the 2011 IT Rules and could not be applied to the current framework. He held that Article 19 rights protecting free speech are available only to Indian citizens, not foreign corporations.

The Centre, represented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, told the court that safe-harbour immunity from liability was conditional and not a right, and questioned whether a foreign corporation like X could claim protections under India’s free speech guarantees. It also noted that X was the only major intermediary that had refused to integrate with the Sahyog system.

X’s Global Government Affairs team posted that it was “deeply concerned” by the ruling, saying the system allows “millions of police officers to issue arbitrary takedown orders” through a “secretive online portal.”

It argued the regime circumvents Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, which sets out the legal process for blocking online content, and undermines citizens’ constitutional rights to free expression.

“We will appeal this order to defend free expression,” X said, adding that the judgment disregarded a recent Bombay High Court ruling that struck down a similar framework as unconstitutional.