[Vikram Sampath v Audrey Truschke] Delhi High Court directs Twitter to take down five more of Truschke's tweets

The Delhi High Court last week directed historian Audrey Truschke to delete five more tweets that had allegedly defamatory content against historian Vikram Sampath [Dr Vikram Sampath v Audrey Truschke and Ors]..Justice Amit Bansal held that Sampath had made a prima facie case in his favour, and in his view, the tweets referred to are indeed defamatory in nature.He further noted that the tweets also had a link to the letter written by Truschke and other historians whose publication has already been injuncted by the Court in February.“In view of the fact that the defendant no.1 (Truschke) has not submitted to the jurisdiction of this Court and is not appearing in these proceedings, the defendant no.4/Twitter is directed to take down the following tweets as mentioned in prayer ‘a’ of the present application,” Justice Bansal directed..The order was passed in a fresh application filed by Sampath through Advocate Mukesh Sharma. The application stated that despite the Court’s interim injunction, Truschke again posted tweets on April 15 and April 18 against Sampath alleging that he had plagiarised the works of various American and Indian academics.It was argued that Truschke's actions “reek of an extremely toxic manner of white privilege” because she feels that just because she is an American of Caucasian heritage, she is entitled to violate the orders of an Indian court..Sampath had filed a suit in the High Court seeking ₹2 crore in damages from Truschke and two other historians who accused him of plagiarism in relation to his works on Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.He also sought permanent injunction on publication of a letter dated February 11 written by historians Truschke, Ananya Chakravarti and Rohit Chopra to Emma Griffin, President of Royal Historical Society (RHS) in Britain.The High Court had on February 18 restrained Truschke and the others from posting any defamatory content against Sampath. Later, on February 24, the High Court had ordered social media platform Twitter to take down five tweets put out by Truschke against Sampath..[Read Order]