Video of Rajat Sharma abusing Congress leader is not fake, says X to Delhi HC
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The social media platform X informed the Delhi High Court on Friday that a video showing journalist Rajat Sharma verbally abusing Congress spokesperson Ragini Nayak on live television appears to be authentic and not edited or fake.
According to Live Law, the video which was posted by Nayak and also shared by Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh and Pawan Khera, has sparked a defamation lawsuit filed by Sharma against the three leaders. Sharma denies using the abusive language attributed to him during the show on India TV on June 4.
During the court hearing, a single bench of Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora was presented with evidence that the video aligns with India TV’s raw footage and Sharma’s own filings in his defamation suit.
X stated that the raw footage, once available on the India TV YouTube channel, confirmed that Sharma did utter the words he denied using.
X emphasized that proving the video was edited requires a thorough examination of evidence, which is a matter for trial. The social media platform argued that Sharma’s claims of the video being edited were vague and unsubstantiated, thus insufficient for the court to conclude that the video was manipulated.
In its application to the High Court, X sought the vacation of a June 14 interim order that had directed the removal of the video by X and the Congress leaders. X contended that the injunction request by Sharma lacked evidence of the content being "malicious" or "palpably false." Granting the injunction would stifle public debate and potentially allow litigation to suppress public participation, X argued.
The Congress leaders, who have not yet removed their posts, also requested the court to deny the injunction. Sharma’s lawyer, Sandeep Sethi, informed the court that while the posts have been blocked in India by X, they have not been deleted by the Congress leaders.
The court directed Khera, Ramesh, and Nayak to delete their posts by 7 PM on Friday and ordered X to unblock the posts by 5 PM.