Delhi High Court Directs Google, Meta, X to Act on Sunil Gavaskar’s Takedown Requests
The Delhi High Court has directed tech companies Google, Meta, and X (formerly Twitter) to act on former Indian cricketer Sunil Gavaskar’s complaints regarding fake content and misuse of his name and photographs online. The case relates to the violation of Gavaskar’s personality rights through unauthorised and misleading online material.
Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora instructed Gavaskar to share the exact web links (URLs) of the offending content with the concerned social media platforms and intermediaries. Once the URLs are provided, the platforms have been asked to examine the complaints and take an appropriate decision within one week.
The Court clarified that Gavaskar must submit the URLs within 48 hours, either directly or through his legal counsel. After reviewing the complaint, the intermediaries are required to inform Gavaskar about the action taken on each request.
Gavaskar approached the High Court alleging that several online accounts were misusing his name and photographs. This included fake statements attributed to him criticising Indian men’s cricket team coach Gautam Gambhir and cricketer Virat Kohli. The suit also pointed out the online sale of fake autographed items and photographs falsely linked to Gavaskar, for which money was being charged from the public.
The Court emphasised that the correct process in such cases is to first approach the intermediaries for content removal before seeking judicial intervention. Justice Arora noted that this mechanism often resolves most grievances and helps the Court focus only on unresolved issues, enabling better adjudication.
Notably, Sunil Gavaskar is the first cricketer to approach the Court specifically for protection of personality rights. In the past, several public figures including Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Anil Kapoor, Jackie Shroff, Karan Johar, and Salman Khan have secured similar protections from the Delhi High Court.
Sunil Gavaskar was represented by Senior Advocate Gopal Jain, briefed by law firm Krida Legal.
