UP: Case filed against Mark Zuckerberg over ‘defamatory’ post against Akhilesh, dropped later

Facebook founder and chief executive officer (CEO) Mark Zuckerberg along with 49 others have been named in a case related to an alleged defamatory post against Samajwadi Party's Akhilesh Yadav. However, police later dropped Zuckerberg's name from the case during the course of the investigation, a PTI report said.

The case was registered on the order of a court in the Kannauj district of UP. On Monday, chief judicial magistrate Dharamveer Singh in Kannauj district directed the police to lodge the case on the complaint of one Amit Kumar, a resident of Sarahati village.

In his application, Kumar had complained that a page on the social media website Facebook, is attempting to tarnish the image of Yadav. He mentioned the page's name as 'Bua Babua.'

The term "Bua Babua" was coined when Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav had entered into an alliance during the parliamentary election in 2019.

Following the court order, a case was registered at Thatia police station, the report said citing SHO Prayag Narayan Bajpayee. Other people named in the case include an administrator of the (Facebook) page.

Kumar said an application was sent to the superintendent of police through a registered post on May 25, but no action was taken, following which he moved the court and urged that a case be registered.

Large social media companies such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and WhatsApp lost legal protection for the user content posted on their platforms in May this year after the government in the country enacted the new Information Technology Act.

According to the new ACt, the companies can be prosecuted for the user-generated content and stands answerable to India civil and criminal laws just like any other citizen of the country.