Mumbai: In response to a writ petition in the Supreme Court challenging the validity of Section 66A of the Information Technology (IT) Act, the Maharashtra government in its counter affidavit dated January 9, 2013 has made no reference to the arrests of two Air India employees though their case was mentioned in the petition.
The Maharashtra government’s affidavit acknowledges that arresting the two girls from Palghar, Shaheen Dadha and Renu Srinivasan, after a post on Facebook was unwarranted. It said that the government was cognisant of the chilling effect that such incidents could create and had taken action in the matter.
However, there is no mention of the case of the Air India employees who were arrested and jailed for 12 days last May under Section 66 A and other provisions of the IT Act and other laws. One of them, Mayank Sharma, told The Hindu on Wednesday that the Supreme Court’s order on November 30, 2012, had issued a rule on the writ petition.
07/02/13 Meena Menon/The Hindu
