Remove anti-Serum content, rules Court

No amount of damages can redeem the damage to the reputation of a person and merely because there have been previous publications on the same issue, the same does not permit repetition of prima facie defamatory allegations, observed the Bombay high court on Monday, while directing two individuals to take down the defamatory content uploaded on social media against the Serum Institute of India and its CEO, Adar Poonawalla.

Justice Riyaz Chagla, on Monday, in an interim order, also restrained two individuals from further posting defamatory content, noting that the SII and Poonawalla are considered to have saved four million lives in India with their vaccine.

"I am of the prima facie view that the contents are per se defamatory. The vaccine is not banned. No case is made out by the defendants,” the judge said in a 48-page order. 

The interim order was passed by the HC while hearing a defamation suit filed by SII seeking restraint on two individuals and their organisations—Yohan Tengra, his organisation Anarchy for Freedom India, and Ambar Koiri and his organisation Awaken India Movement— who have been allegedly posting erroneous content against the company and Poonawalla.

The court has also directed the defendants to issue an unconditional apology stating the defamatory contents were baseless, unsubstantiated and unwarranted.