The Bombay High Court on Friday stayed the order of a single Bench directing Abhijeet Bhansali, a social media influencer, to pull down his controversial YouTube video ‘Is Parachute Coconut Oil 100% Pure?’.
A Division Bench of Chief Justice Pradeep Nandrajog and Justice Bharati Dangre was hearing a commercial appeal filed by Mr. Bhansali through his advocate, Abhinav Chandrachud, against the single Bench’s order passed on January 15.
In its 24-page order, the Bench said, prima facie, the single judge wrongly held that the appellant compared the respondent’s (Marico) product with an unknown product, which was a virgin coconut oil. The court said, “The learned single judge has overlooked the fact that even the respondent had claimed its oil to be a virgin coconut oil. Thus, prima facie, the four instances of falsehood in the judgment which we have extracted are found to be incorrect.”
The order said the appellant’s only error was to refer to the oil as an organic coconut oil. The court said this was a trivial error and did not mislead viewers.
The Bench said, “The signature tune of the presentation is that Parachute oil is not extracted from fresh coconuts and expeller pressed process is used to extract oil from copra. Due to this reason, the oil gets heated and loses its nutrients, rendering it money ill spent for external application on the body or garnishing. It is value for money for cooking only, but if coconut oil at a lesser price is available for cooking purposes, why pay more?”
