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Bombay High Court: Versus
Bombay High Court: Versus
DOC
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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY
ORDINARY ORIGINAL CIVIL JURISDICTION
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NOTICE OF MOTION (L) NO. 2760 OF 2015
IN
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SUIT (L) NO. 1040 OF 2015
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Nityanand Sinha …Defendant
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Mr. T. Cooper, with Ms. D. Mani, Ms. A. Nair & Mr. Surendheao,
i/b Indialaw, for the Plaintiffs.
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1. Heard Mr. Cooper for the Plaintiffs. Notice has been given to
the Defendant. An Affidavit of Service dated 8th October 2015 is
filed.
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between a subsidiary of the 1st Plaintiff and one SAS Realtech. The
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2nd Plaintiff is described, therefore, as a step-down subsidiary of
the 1st Plaintiff.
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3. The Defendant is an ex-employee of the 2nd Plaintiff. In
2014, the Defendant was a General Manager with the 2nd Plaintiff.
He was stationed at Bahadurgarh, Haryana as Project Head of the
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Plaintiffs’ New Haven Residential Project being undertaken there.
4.
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On 16th June 2015, the Defendant’s services were
terminated. Although the Plaintiffs have set out the reasons for this
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termination, I do not think these are germane for today’s purposes.
If necessary, these will be considered at the final hearing of the
Notice of Motion. It is sufficient to state that relations between the
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Plaintiffs and the Defendant since that time have been very strained
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and that there has been much acrimony at least on the part of the
Defendant. The Plaintiffs have had to file at least one police
complaint against the Defendant. According to the Plaintiffs, the
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Plaintiffs’ external counsel and the Defendant. It makes for the
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most unpleasant reading.
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has continued to threaten the Plaintiffs and their officials and make
unreasonable monetary demands, in respect of which the Plaintiffs
have adopted separate civil and criminal proceedings, but that the
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Defendant has since 24th September 2015 been using social media
networks, specifically, Facebook and Twitter to make a number of
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allegations against the Plaintiffs. These are said to be defamatory.
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7. Samples of the Defendant’s posts are annexed to the plaint at
Exhibits “C1”, “C2”, “D1” and “D2”. I must note that for some
reason some of these offending posts have been made by the
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Defendant not only on his own Facebook page but also on the
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reproduced at pages 40, 41, 42, 43, 51 and 52 of the plaint that seem
to have been seen by third parties and received at least some form
of approbation. The Defendant’s tweets do not seem to have gained
much currency but I noticed that he has not merely posted these on
his own Twitter account but has tagged various news channels such
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so on. The intention is quite clear and that is to give the widest
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possible publicity to the Defendant’s posts. There is, therefore, no
question about the publication and dissemination of the Defendant.
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9. Mr. Cooper says that the posts are per se defamatory. He
draws attention to paragraphs 13 and 18 of the plaint in which it is
pointed out that the Defendant’s allegations are inter alia of
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unethical conduct by the Plaintiffs, allegations without, he says, a
shred of truth, and of innocent customers being “fleeced”, also
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equally false. There is generally a denigration of the Plaintiffs’ and
of the Tata Group as a whole. There is, he says, nothing genuine
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about these posts. They do not fall within the realm of fair
comment. They are defamatory and slanderous allegations, and
arise from, and only from, the Defendant’s demonstrable
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only to further a private agenda and a vendetta of some kind. That
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is not protected, and if the Defendant labours under some delusion
that because his posts are on the Web they are somehow immune
from ordinary civil and criminal law, he is utterly in error. If the
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Defendant intends to plead truth, then I would have expected his
posts to at least hint at it. They do not.
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11. I am satisfied that a prima facie case has been made out at
least sufficient for the grant of ad-interim injunction. I have also no
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doubt that the balance of convenience favours the Plaintiffs and
permitting the Defendant to continue posting will cause the
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Plaintiffs’ irretrievable harm possibly to an extent that does not lend
itself to easy monetary recompense.
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terms of prayer clauses (a) and (b) of the Notice of Motion, which
read thus:
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malicious, scandalous statement(s),
allegations, insinuations, either written
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or spoken, thereby amounting to libel, by
way of publication of the same, and/or
slander against the Plaintiffs, then
directors, principal officers, agents,
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representatives, employees, servants,
clients, business associates, business
partners, companies forming a part of the
Tata group of companies by way of emails,
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letters, SMSes, social media posts,
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websites, newspapers print or electronic,
or in any other manner whatsoever, to any
third parties/ general public including
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but not limited to newspaper editors,
journalists, clients, business
associates/business partners of the
Plaintiffs/Tata group of companies or any
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14. List the Notice of Motion for hearing and final disposal on
23rd December 2015 at 3:00 pm.
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(G. S. PATEL, J.)
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CERTIFICATE
“Certified to be a true and correct copy of the original signed Judgment/Order.”
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