Sunil Sachdeva v. Owner of Domain Name Www.Cjr7.Com & Ors

RAJIV SAHAI ENDLAW, J. NOVEMBER 13, 2019/"ak"

* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI % Date of decision: 13th November, 2019. + CS(OS) 385/2019, IA No.10455/2019(u/O.XXXIX R-1&2 CPC) & IA No.11070/2019(u/O.XXXIX R-1&2 CPC) SUNIL SACHDEVA ..... Plaintiff Through: Mr. Sidhant Kumar, Adv. Versus OWNER OF DOMAIN NAME WWW.CJR7.COM & ORS. ..... Defendants Through: Counsel for D-2 (appearance not given). Mr. Akhil Anand, Adv. for D-3. Mr. Neel Mason with Mr. Tarang Gupta & Mr. Shivang Sharma, advs. for D-4/ Google LLC USA. CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJIV SAHAI ENDLAW 1. The plaintiff instituted this suit against (i) owner of Domain Name www.cjr7.com; (ii) Net4 Network Services Limited; and, (iii) Google India Private Limited, (i) for recovery of damages of Rs.2,10,00,000/- from defendant no.1 for defaming the plaintiff; (ii) for permanent injunction restraining the defendants from hosting online on their website and online search engine respectively statements defamatory of the plaintiff; (iii) for permanent injunction restraining the defendants from posting or otherwise communicating to any person or public at large, by any means, the allegedly defamatory content; and, (iv) for mandatory injunction directing the defendants to tender an apology and to permanently block and/or disable access of any person to the URL https://cjr7.com/part-1-medanta-and-its- shady-investor-sunil-sachdeva-and-these-people-are-being-given-a-free- pass-and-to-cash-out-with-1000-crores-while-madhu-trehan-has-the- audacity-to-judge-people-and-call-her/. 2. The suit came up first before this Court on 2nd August, 2019, when the following order was passed:- "3. The plaintiff has sued the defendant no.1, Owner of Domain Name www.cjr7.com, the Registrar of domain names, with which the defendant no.1 Domain Name www.cjr7.com is registered, and Google India Private Limited, for permanent injunction, to restrain them from hosting online defamatory statements on their website and for ancillary reliefs. 4. It is the plea of the plaintiff, that from the domain name, the identity of the person behind the domain name cannot be known. 5. A perusal of the printout of the impugned content on the domain name also does not show the same to be disclosing the identity of the author thereof. 6. Though the impugned contents are found to be in the nature of a whistle blower but it is felt that when the publisher thereof is not even willing to disclose the identity, such malicious campaign should not be permitted. 7. The counsel for the plaintiff is informed, that it has come before this Court in other cases, that Google India Private Limited is unable to comply with the directions as generally sought against all the three defendants in the present case and it is only Google Inc. which can comply with such a direction, if issued. 8. The plaintiff is at liberty to make the necessary amends. 9. Issue summons of the suit and notice of the application for interim relief, electronically to the defendants, returnable on 29th August, 2019. The defendant no.1 be also served through domain name. 10. The defendant no.2, stated to be the Registrar of the domain names with which the defendant no.1 Domain Name www.cjr7.com is registered, is also directed to, on the next date of hearing, disclose to this Court in a sealed envelop, the particulars of the identity of the defendant no.1 Domain Name www.cjr7.com." 3. Pursuant to the aforesaid order, the plaintiff impleaded Google LLC, USA and amended the plaint to claim the last of the aforesaid reliefs and which amendment was allowed and summons of the suit and the notice of the application for interim relief were ordered to be issued to the newly impleaded defendants as well. 4. The counsel for the defendant no.2, on 29th August, 2019 supplied the details of the person behind the domain name, impleaded as defendant no.1, as under:- "Customer Details: - CRN_ID-000541133 FIRST_NAME-nish LAST_NAME-nish ORGANIZATION_NAME-CJR7 ADDRESS-S-92 Greater Kailash CITY-Delhi STATE-Delhi POSTAL_CODE-110