Prefixing “de” to a word in the English language leads to, in many instances, the polar opposite result of the word sans the prefixation. Words such as demerit, de-escalate, dehydrate are just examples reflective of this position.  Fortunately, that is not the case when you look at the word deliberation, which is standalone and reflective of a careful dialogue between the protagonists in question.

The recent concerns raised by Oka J on the live-tweeting of court proceedings have once again brought to the fore an issue where transparency of proceedings in court gets pitted with the appropriateness of instant reporting. Oka J’s concerns on live-tweeting, where a free and frank deliberation with counsel during a hearing gets projected as a judge’s final view on a case, are in sharp contrast to the views of Chandrachud J at an event held at Oxford in 2025, where he said, “[e]very statement made by a judge is shared on social media. This is something we should not and cannot halt.” Though Chandrachud J. followed on in his speech to state that judges sometimes face criticism and should be prepared to accept such critique, Oka J’s words of caution reflected his concern that questions posed by the court during its deliberations with counsel are often misconstrued, as users of social media may fail to appreciate that their purpose is to simply elicit the best out of counsel and clarify points of concern.

While Chandrachud and Oka JJ’s approaches on live-tweeting are like two ships passing by the night, they do raise an issue which needs to be grappled with. Tweeting is done for commercial gains, with the fastest fingers first dominating the race. In some ways, live-tweeting, can be compared to sports commentary aired over radio. Perhaps oblivious to Gen Y who have grown up in the age of the internet, sports commentary over the radio needs to be descriptive of every step undertaken by the sportsperson to allow the listener to believe they are part of the action. Commentating on a cricket match involves commenting not only over every ball that is bowled, but recording every nano-second by granularly describing the bowler’s run-up, the action, the delivery and pitch of the ball, the lifting of the bat, and beyond. However, unlike the commentary of every ball, which ends with a result within a few seconds and leaves little to the listener’s imagination, live-tweeting of court proceedings is very different. First, court proceedings are not a sport to be followed as entertainment. Second, when a judge deliberates with counsel, the closure of issues sometimes doesn’t happen for hours or even days. The deliberation leads to a two-way dialogue between counsel and the court, with the judge having to consider a view, often at odds with the impression a judge may have had, with an open mind.

The process of deliberation is indispensable to the judicial process. Live-tweeting, on the other hand, is a part of allowing the deliberation to reach a larger section of society. However, given that the dialogue between court and counsel is not a drama rehearsed with scripted lines, it also means that Shakespeare’s verse that [a]ll the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players”, is a performance that is not being enacted on a choreographed stage.

So, if every query is broadcast as a verdict-in-waiting, its dissemination has the effect of undermining the judicial process. That is because it reflects a level of uncertainly. While judges, seasoned in their art of judicial making may not be affected by how their sentences get consumed outside the courtroom, that may not hold true for the Twitterati, who can well be misguided by comments made in court. Such misguiding gets accentuated by controversial observations, because they have the tendency to be blown out of proportion for generating greater traction on social media.

Where should the line be drawn on live-tweeting? Even a performance in a theater is best judged by its final act and not by the improvisations during its rehearsal. Similarly, court proceedings should be considered the rehearsal where ideas can stumble before they stand.  At the same time, as TS Eliot said in The Rock¸ “[w]here is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?” Given that live-tweeting gives us more information but less wisdom, its eventual utility in disseminating information should be steered in a way that neither misguides its recipient nor results in a de-liberation of a free and frank deliberation between court and counsel. That can be done only if the tweeters are held accountable, akin to the position in Canada, where live-tweeting is undertaken in a non-disruptive manner, consistent with the dignity and solemnity of court proceedings. Neither dramatised nor blown out of proportion, or like a running cricket commentary which allows the recipient’s imagination to run wild.

Nakul Dewan is a Senior Advocate and King’s Counsel.