Wikipedia's page regarding ANI was criticized by the Court, which also stated that encyclopedias must maintain their objectivity.

Wikipedia's "opinionated" and "non-neutral" article that called Asian News International (ANI) a "propaganda tool" for the Central government was criticized by the Delhi High Court on Tuesday.

Wikipedia is regarded as an encyclopedia and should remain impartial rather than seeming like an online diary, according to a bench of Justices Prathiba M. Singh and Rajneesh Kumar Gupta.

We all use Wikipedia, let's face it. I vividly remember that you could look at Wikipedia and teach kids about it while they were in high school. 'Pedia' is derived from encyclopaedia. An encyclopedia must be quite impartial. In that sense, Wikipedia is doing a fantastic job.The Court said orally that "it becomes like any other blog if you start taking sides like this."

The bench added that Wikipedia cannot contest a court's ruling on the basis of merit if it claims to be an intermediary.

"You have already argued that you act as a middleman. Their only responsibility under the IT Rules is to carry out the court's orders. You can't make a merit-based defense. "You cannot even argue on merits if you are an intermediary and the court orders you to take down," the Court emphasized.

The Court did, however, somewhat alter the single-judge's April 2 judgment ordering ANI to remove the defamatory content against ANI and prevent similar content from being published in the future.

According to the Division Bench, ANI can alert the platform to similar content if it appears on the site again, and Wikipedia would take appropriate action after removing the defamatory text.

The Division Bench stated that the single judge's order to lift the protected status placed on ANI's page, which allegedly restricted page updates, will be stayed.

After Wikipedia appealed the single-judge's ruling, the order was issued.

In an appearance for Wikipedia today, Senior Advocate Akhil Sibal contended that the single-judge ruling is predicated on the incorrect assumption that the ANI content was published in 2024. He maintained that the ANI page hasn't changed since 2019 and that Wikipedia doesn't hire or compensate the page's authors. The injunction is very broad, Sibal continued.

Advocate Sidhant Kumar, who was speaking on behalf of ANI, stated that he would not object to the ANI page being restored to its pre-February 26, 2019 version (the date of the alterations). According to Kumar, Wikipedia has not cooperated with the court's decision or the IT Rules' requirements that they remove content within 36 hours.

He went on to say that Wikipedia has maintained that it has the authority to change information and that it cannot act as a middleman in such circumstances.

Justice Subramonium Prasad's ruling, which declared the ANI page to be against Wikipedia policy and noted that the content was not neutral, has been appealed by Wikipedia.

"It seems that all of the assertions on the Plaintiff's page are taken from publications, which are essentially opinionated and editorial pages. In order to ensure that the impartial policy of Defendant No. 1 is not broken, it stated that the defendant, who is adhering to the policy that prohibits declaring opinions as facts and claims to be an encyclopedia, must also determine whether or not the opinions are based on the original articles.

The Court further stated that Wikipedia cannot simply claim to be an intermediary and absolve itself of responsibility for anything submitted on its platform. According to the Court, Wikipedia has an obligation to guard against defamation on its site.

"Defendant No.1 (Wikipedia), therefore, cannot completely wash its hands of the contents of the article on the ground that it is only an intermediary and cannot be held responsible for the statement that is published on its platform," the Court stated.

The High Court's single judge summoned Wikipedia in July 2024 and directed it to reveal details on the three individuals who edited ANI's Wikipedia page.

The sole judge strongly objected to Wikipedia's actions and issued a notice for contempt of court after ANI protested that Wikipedia had not followed this direction. After that, Wikipedia appealed to the Division Bench. An authorized representative of Wikipedia was also required to appear in person in court on October 25 by the solitary judge.

Wikipedia contested these single-judge orders before the Division Bench, where ANI and Wikipedia came to a mutual understanding.

Wikipedia agrees to notify the users who made the adjustments while keeping their identities private under this arrangement. The three users who were accused of making derogatory edits that damaged ANI's reputation were then given notifications by Wikipedia.

Importantly, the Division Bench later ordered the removal of a page about the High Court case called "Asian News International vs. Wikimedia Foundation" from Wikipedia after criticizing it for hosting it. The Supreme Court is currently considering an appeal against this order.