The Delhi High Court on Tuesday closed the proceedings in a defamation lawsuit filed by Indian Railway Personnel Service (IRPS) officer Anjali Birla, daughter of Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, against objectionable posts circulated on social media platforms.
Justice Jyoti Singh passed a decree in favour of Anjali Birla in the suit filed against X Corp (formerly Twitter), Google, and unidentified individuals. The lawsuit sought removal of posts alleging that Birla had secured her position as an officer by leveraging her father’s influence to clear the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) examination.
Anjali Birla’s counsel clarified before the court that she had cleared the UPSC Civil Services Examination (CSE) in the 2019 consolidated reserve list and joined the Indian Railways as an IRPS officer.
Earlier, in an interim order passed in July last year, the court had directed X Corp and Google to take down the defamatory content and restrained unknown parties from sharing or reposting such material.
During the latest hearing, X Corp’s counsel informed the court that 12 out of 16 posts had already been voluntarily removed by their originators, and access to the remaining four had been blocked by the platform in compliance with the interim order.
The court further directed X Corp to remove the remaining posts and instructed that any similar posts flagged in the future by Anjali Birla should also be taken down immediately.
“The purpose of posting the impugned social media posts in 2024 and in the language they have been posted do not appear to be bonafide,” the court had earlier observed, noting that the officer was appointed to IRPS in 2021 and the posts seemed to lack due verification.
Birla’s counsel contended that the allegations were defamatory and intended to malign her reputation as well as that of her father, a senior constitutional authority. The counsel also highlighted that similar accusations surfaced in 2021 but were refuted after media investigations.
“This fresh wave of posts has coincided with the ongoing NEET and UPSC exams controversy, creating the false impression that my client and her family are involved. Private pictures of my client have been misused online with baseless claims that she is a model,” the counsel argued, adding that a complaint has also been filed with the cyber crime department.
