In an order passed on 28 January 2015, the Supreme Court directed, as an interim measure, that Google, Yahoo and Microsoft shall not advertise or sponsor any advertisement which would violate Section 22 of the Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act (PCPNDT Act), 1994, relating to prenatal sex determination. The Supreme Court further directed that if any advertisement is already there on any search engine, the same shall be withdrawn forthwith by the search engine.
The Supreme Court further directed Google, Yahoo and Microsoft to put the above order on the policy page as also on the page containing “terms and conditions of service” on their websites.
These directions were issued by a bench of the Supreme Court comprising of Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Prafulla C. Pant in a PIL writ petition filed by Sabu Mathew George. As reported earlier, the Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, 1994, as amended from time to time, prohibits advertisements for tests conducted for prenatal sex determination; however, several such advertisements regularly appear on the Internet. In the above writ petition, it was highlighted that search engines such as Google India, Yahoo India and Microsoft Corporation, are still getting things advertised in violation of the legal provisions contained in the aforesaid Act.
During the hearing on 28 January 2015, on the basis of an additional affidavit filed by the Union of India, Solicitor General of India Ranjit Kumar informed the court that it can stop the presentation of any kind of thing that relates to sex selection and eventual abortion, if the URL and the I.P. addresses are given along with other information, regard being had to the keywords, namely, “pre-natal diagnostic tests for selection of sex before or after conception, pre-natal conception test, pre-natal diagnostic, pre-natal foetoscopy for sex selection, pre-natal ultrasonography for sex selection, sex selection procedure, sex selection technique, sex selection test, sex selection administration, sex selection prescription, sex selection services, sex selection management, sex selection process, sex selection conduct, pre-natal image scanning for sex selection, pre-natal diagnostic procedure for sex selection, sex determination using scanner, sex determination using machines, sex determination using equipment, scientific sex determination and sex selection”. The Solicitor General stated that such blocking / filtering on keywords advertisements links can be effectively or regularly done by the search engines as they have access to their respective mathematical algorithms all the time.
The next date of hearing is on 11 February 2015, for hearing on issues relating to total blocking of the items that have been suggested by the Union of India and providing the URL and IP addresses by Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.
The full order of the Supreme Court can be seen here. Earlier news coverage on this issue at Tilak Marg can be seen here.
