The Karnataka High Court on Thursday refused to grant interim protection to Elon Musk’s social media company, X Corp, which claimed that the Union government was misusing legal provisions to censor through its takedown orders.

During proceedings in the plea filed by Elon Musk in the Karnataka High Court on Thursday, X Corp said that it follows the law of the land in its operations but alleged that several government functionaries issued takedown orders akin to censorship.

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The Elon Musk’s company, represented by senior advocate KG Raghavan, alleged that the government “wanted us to join the Sahyog portal. This is, in effect, a censorship portal”, a claim vehemently countered by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.

Raghavan argued in the court of Justice M Nagaprasanna that X Corp was entitled to interim relief as the law was completely codified under Section 69A of the IT Act. He contended that action should only be taken in accordance with Section 69A of the IT Act, questioning, “How can one say I will issue blocking orders under Section 79 (3), when it should be done under Section 69A IT Act?”

Raghavan also claimed that the Centre had threatened to withdraw safe harbour protections unless X Corp complied with takedown orders. The apprehensions of X Corp arise from the use of Section 79 (3), which says that an intermediary (like X) will lose safe harbour protection if it has actual knowledge of unlawful content on its platform. Actual knowledge has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to mean ‘court order’, the senior advocate said.

“I have thousands of posts on my platform; I can’t sit down and check if each post is in accordance with the law. There is no way I can determine whether something is unlawful. This provision cannot be viewed as a standalone provision by the Centre to issue blocking orders. It has to be read with Section 69A of the IT Act,” the advocate for X Corp contended.

He then sought to respond to the written submissions from the Centre, running into some 1,500 pages, and sought time.

The Union government, through SG Mehta and ASG Aravind Kamath, maintained that the Centre had not done anything that would entitle X Corp to interim relief.

After hearing arguments from both sides and considering the prayer of X Corp for time to file a rejoinder to the entral government’s objections, the court posted the matter to April 24 and also ruled that an “interim order, other than what is already granted earlier, is not required at this stage.