Terming it “prima facie contemptuous”, the Delhi High Court has ordered the takedown of a Wikipedia page on ANI’s defamation suit against Wikimedia Foundation which hosts the platform, LiveLaw reported.

This comes two days after a division bench took exception to a page – titled ‘Asian News International vs. Wikimedia Foundation’ – on the pending defamation proceedings containing remarks on a previous order. 

“You have put learned single judge in line of fire. This page will have to be taken down, otherwise we will not hear him... You may be world’s most powerful entity but we live in a country which is governed by the rule of law and we take pride in that,” a bench of Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela had reportedly told Wikipedia’s counsel, according to The Hindu.

The court’s remarks had reportedly come while hearing Wikipedia’s appeal against a single judge order to disclose the details of individuals who edited the ANI Wikipedia page.

As Wikipedia sought to protect the anonymity of the persons behind the edits, the court reportedly said, “The system cannot be a cloak to defame someone…You are accusing someone, a journalist, of being a state-sponsored agent.”

On August 20, the single judge had ordered Wikipedia to disclose the details of those who had made alleged defamatory edits to the ANI page. On September 5, the single judge had cautioned Wikipedia for failing to comply with the court’s previous order.

The Wikimedia Foundation had earlier said in a statement that “as a technology host, the Wikimedia Foundation generally does not add, edit or determine content published on Wikipedia. Wikipedia’s content is determined by its global community of volunteer editors (also known as the ‘Wikimedia Community’) who compile and share information on notable subjects”.

Newslaundry had earlier reported about the alleged defamatory edits. Read here.

Does Wikipedia have control over who writes and edits on its pages? How does it work? Why has the court made such strong remarks? Watch our explainer to understand the case.

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