The Jharkhand High Court on Sunday temporarily restrained the state government from suspending internet services to curb malpractices in public sector examinations, reported Bar and Bench.
The Hemant Soren-led government suspended internet services on Friday and Saturday as the Jharkhand Staff Selection Commission examination was conducted to prevent cheating or question paper leaks.
In a special hearing on Sunday, the court told the government not to suspend any internet services on the grounds of conducting examinations without its permission while a petition on the matter was pending.
A bench of Justices Ananda Sen and Anubha Rawat Choudhary was hearing a public interest litigation by lawyer Rajendra Krishna against the partial shutdown of mobile internet on Friday and Saturday. The shutdown was later extended to broadband services.
Krishna expressed concerns about the state government’s decision to impose a blanket ban on internet services instead of implementing a partial shutdown. He said this violated the court’s order instructions from Saturday, which only allowed for mobile services to be suspended temporarily.
On Saturday, the court declined to grant interim relief to the petitioner on the grounds that the state government had assured that only mobile internet would be suspended.
The additional advocate general, however, informed the court that the government decided to block all internet connectivity based on an “intelligence input” it received on Saturday night.
“This is a fraud played on this court and is a deceitful action,” the court said about the blanket ban on internet services. “The interim order passed by this court reveals that the balance of convenience between the parties was taken into consideration, i.e. balance of convenience between the public at large and the concern of the state to conduct proper examination, but the balance itself has been disturbed by the fresh action of the state.”
The court said it found no evidence to support the state government’s action and warned that it amounted to judicial overreach and prima facie criminal contempt, reported Bar and Bench. It said the government should have approached it to seek a modification in the order.
“Merely putting the words and phrases ‘public interest’, ‘adequate safety of students at large’, ‘ensuring fair examination’ without any factual backing to arrive at the said conclusion is not sufficient to shut down the entire internet services, that too throughout the entire state, as it is now well established that shutting down of internet facility amounts to infringement of fundamental rights enshrined under Article 19 of the Constitution of India,” the court said.
The court will hear the matter next on November 14.
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