Responding to the Sindh High Court’s (SHC) decision banning TikTok, the Minister for Information, Fawad Chaudhry, has said that that the country will never be able to overcome the economic hurdles if the judiciary keeps on interfering in matters of digital growth.
Taking to twitter, the minister said that he was puzzled after reading yesterday’s decision on the suspension of TikTok. He said that if the judicial reforms are not introduced soon, the technology sector would keep losing billions due to “judicial activism”
عدالتی اصلاحات نہ کی گئیں تو ملک اقتصادی بحران سے کبھی باہر نہیں نکل سکے گا کل سے TikTok کو بین کرنے اور نیشنل بینک کے صدر کو ہٹانے کے فیصلے پڑہ کر سر چکرا گیا ہے کہ ہماری عدالتیں کیا کر رہی ہیں ؟ پہلے ہی یہ ملک ایسے جوڈیشل ایکٹوازم کے ہاتھوں اربوں ڈالر کے نقصانات برداشت کر رہاہے
— Ch Fawad Hussain (@fawadchaudhry) June 30, 2021
Sindh High Court (SHC) has a ban on the video-sharing application, TikTok, just three months after the application’s countrywide ban was lifted. The ban has been promulgated until the next hearing on July 8th.
The decision came through the hearing in which the court issued a notice to the attorney general of Pakistan and directed him to follow the orders and block the application.
The lawyer of the petitioner in his argument mentioned that Peshawar High Court had earlier banned the application after some objectionable videos were uploaded on the platform that was considered immoral and against the teachings of Islam.
The lawyer added that his client had contacted Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) before reaching out to the high court in this regard.
Sindh High Court in its detailed order said that TikTok did not abide by the “the constant undertakings and assurances” given by the platform to other courts and PTA to stop the spread of vulgarity in Pakistan.
The platform also failed to respect the basic injunction of Islam and culture of Pakistan and “recently started a social media campaign whereby they are celebrating ‘LGBT (Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) Pride Month’”, the order added.
Read More: TikTok removes six million videos in Pakistan after bans
In April, Peshawar High Court had lifted the ban from the application but had directed the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to regulate the content and remove any objectionable content from the video-sharing application.
PHC Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid had directed PTA director-general to elaborate on the plan and actions taken by the regulator.
Fawad Chaudry had also pleaded with the judges earlier to not hear cases relating to digital media and had warned that Pakistan would not be able to attract foreign investment if the state policy on the technology sector is not kept in check.
In response to the ban, Tiktok has stated that it has “robust policies, processes and technologies” for reviewing immoral/violent content.