Supreme Court Advocate-on-Record (AoR) D. Siva Rami Reddy has complained to Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud, seeking action against five persons who logged into the live streaming of the proceedings pertaining to TDP national president N. Chandrababu Naidu’s Special Leave Petition (SLP) in skill development scam case on October 10 and posted messages in the chat box that amounted to denigrating the Majesty of Justice.
He also requested the CJI to pass appropriate orders on the usage of chat box and emojis during the live streaming of court proceedings to ensure that they were not disturbed.
Mr. Siva Rami Reddy said that the streaming of the proceedings of the Supreme Court through video-conference links had been of great convenience to the travelling advocates and party-in- persons/ AoRs.
The CJI has been nudging the High Courts to switch to hybrid hearing mode and comply with the e-Courts mandate. But, the misuse of these facilities by unscrupulous elements was causing a lot of trouble, he said.
Referring to the live streaming of the hearing of Mr. Naidu’s case, the above mentioned individuals flooded the chat box with messages, despite warnings from the court master not to post emojis or switching on the camera.
The messages were in support of the appellant (Mr. Naidu) and cast aspersions on the government of Andhra Pradesh and berated Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy.
This act (of posting messages) was unwarranted and vitiated the court atmosphere. The decency and decorum of the court proceedings and the Supreme Court was tarnished by the comments and messages. Therefore, the CJI should take action suo motu against Harish Madipati, Sushmita and Nalluri Sumanth and two others whose identities were concealed.
