The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a PIL seeking to link all social media accounts to Aadhaar to stop fake, troll accounts from overpowering social media platforms. The court has said all matters need not come to the apex court.

While hearing a PIL on social media accounts, the Supreme Court said, Everything doesn’t need to come to Supreme Court. This issue is before the Madras High Court and you can go there.

The plea sought a direction to the Centre for appropriate steps to link social media accounts with Aadhaar card to ‘check menace of fake and paid news’. It was filed by lawyer and BJP leader Ashwini Upadhyay. The plea also sought directions to the Centre for apposite steps to declare publication of paid news and political advertisements 48 hours before an election as a “corrupt practice” under the Representation of People Act, 1951.

It claimed that 10 per cent of the 3.5 crore Twitter handles were duplicate, which included hundreds in the names of eminent people such as chief ministers and even the president and the prime minister of the nations.

The plea also said millions of Facebook accounts were bogus, which used real photos of constitutional authorities and were used to promote casteism, communalism and separatism, endangering national integration and were also the root cause of several riots. The plea sought linking of social media accounts with Aadhaar, saying those “offend the right to know” as fake and paid news influenced choice in a “negative manner”.

“Exposure to accurate information is a necessity for electors to make an informed choice, but fake news has the tendency to influence this choice in a negative manner. The publication of fake news involves use of black money, under-reporting of election expenses of political parties and candidates and indulging in other kinds of malpractice,” the petition had said.

–India Legal Bureau