The legal wrangle in Pakistan over blasphemous content being posted on popular social networking website Facebook is yet to be settled as a superior court has sought a detailed report from authorities on steps they have taken to address this issue.
Justice Ijaz Ahmed Chaudhry of the Lahore High Court has asked the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority and the Director of Telecom Wireless to furnish a report on the steps they have taken against the posting of blasphemous material on Facebook and other websites internet and to prevent people gaining access to such content.
The judge yesterday gave the authorities three weeks to file a reply and annexed two other identical petitions against blasphemous contents with the main case.
Earlier, Director of Telecom Wireless Mudassar Hussain informed the court that the administration of Facebook removed blasphemous and objectionable material following a complaint by Pakistani authorities.
Hussain said many other websites, including Youtube and Wikipedia too had removed such material from their webpages. He also pointed out to the judge that many other websites contained objectionable materials but nobody noticed them or filed petitions against them in court.
He said that in 2006, an inter-ministerial committee was formed to control such acts and the petitioners could approach it for the removal of objectionable materials from the internet.
The petitioner, Muhammad Azhar Siddique, who is the chairman of the Judicial Activism Panel, rejected Hussain's statement and said objectionable materials were still accessible in the country.
He said Hussain had earlier told the court that authorities could block hate material within 24 hours of it being displayed on a website. Justice Chaudhry directed Hussain to inform the court at the next hearing about steps the authorities have taken to block objectionable materials from the internet.
Siddique, in his petition, has sought a permanent ban on access to Facebook in Pakistan for repeating its blasphemous acts and holding a contest on "Everybody Burn Quran Day."
Earlier this year, authorities had temporarily blocked access to Facebook and several other websites for hosting blasphemous material and spreading hate material against Muslims.
