X, Facebook Told To Drop Posts Linking Hardeep Puri's Daughter To Jeffrey Epstein

In a big relief to Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri's daughter Himayani Puri, the Delhi High Court on Tuesday directed social media platforms like X, Google, YouTube, Meta and LinkedIn and other online platforms to take down the allegedly defamatory content linking her to American financier and child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Himayani Puri had moved the Delhi High Court, alleging defamation and seeking Rs 10 crore in damages over reports linking her to Epstein, who was found hanging in his US jail cell in 2019 after being arrested on charges of sex trafficking of minors.

Senior advocate Mahesh Jaithamalani appeared for Puri and argued that she is a victim of the attack because she is the daughter of a cabinet minister.

"...there is both a personal malice and, I suspect, political malice as well. This is all a figment of someone's imagination – that a firm of which I used to be a partner received money from Epstein," he argued for Puri in court.

He said that earlier, the minister's wife was also targeted with allegations of illegally acquiring overseas property.

A bench of Justice Mini Pushkarna, while issuing notice to all parties, including journalistic reports, directed a takedown of such content till the court hears the defamation suit.

The court, however, clarified that for the time being it will consider taking down content in India alone, since the 'global takedown' aspect is pending before a division bench of the High Court.

"The present injunction order operates within the Indian domain with respect to videos and content uploaded within Indian jurisdiction and from IP addresses within India. In so far as URLs and links are uploaded from outside India, defendants are directed to block access from being viewed in India," Justice Pushkarna ordered.

Even as there is no order for a global takedown, links to reports from outside India will be blocked in India.

Senior advocate Arvind Datar, appearing for Meta, submitted that the platform can only block the content in India and not globally.

Jethmalani argued that if the content is uploaded from a computer device in India, then a global takedown order is permissible.

However, Datar contended that the issue of global takedown is pending before a division bench of the court.

The matter is now listed for August 7.

Himayani Puri has filed a Rs 10 crore defamation suit seeking a "John Doe" order for taking down the content.

According to Puri's suit, the defamatory content started surfacing from February 22, 2026, alleging that she maintained direct or indirect business, financial, personal, or other network associations with Epstein and/or his criminal activities.