Sindh High Court withdraws ban on Tiktok

Earlier on June 28, the Sindh High Court had banned Tiktok, against which the PTA had filed a miscellaneous petition.

Sindh High Court withdraws ban on Tiktok
The Sindh High Court had banned Tiktok 28 June

The Sindh High Court has lifted the ban on social media video app Tiktok and directed the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) to take a decision.

The Sindh High Court heard PTA's petition against the ban on Tiktok and the court issued directions to the PTA.

The PTA took a stand before the court that the PTA has to decide on the petition of the complainant. After the decision, the petitioner can approach the Sindh High Court.

PTA's counsel told the court that the petitioner's application was being processed and a decision would be taken by July 5. He also asked the court to withdraw the restraining order.

The Sindh High Court directed the PTA to expedite the disposal of Tiktok applications and withdrew the ban on Tiktok.

The court directed that the petitions be disposed of expeditiously on the complaints of the petitioner regarding the spread of obscenity including homosexuality and adjourned the hearing till July 5.

Tiktok Banned in Pakistan

It may be recalled that on June 28, the Sindh High Court, at the request of a citizen, had ordered the PTA to close the short video sharing application Tiktok till July 8.

In the petition, the citizen had sought a ban on Tiktok due to the presence of immoral and obscene material and the court, while hearing the citizen's request, immediately directed the PTA to suspend Tiktok till the next hearing on July 8.

Tiktok Banned in Peshawar

In March, before the Sindh High Court, the Peshawar High Court had also ordered the closure of Tiktok due to the presence of immoral material.

Tiktok was shut down immediately following court orders and the short video sharing application was closed for a few days.

The Peshawar High Court had also ordered the closure of Tiktok during the hearing of petitions filed by several citizens.

The PTA also shut down Tiktok nationwide in October 2020 due to the presence of unethical content, after the PTA had issued notices to the application management to remove pornographic content.

The Tiktok administration later claimed to have removed millions of videos based on inappropriate content, after which the PTA restored the Tiktok service.

In March 2021, the Tiktok service was suspended for 10 days on the orders of the Peshawar High Court, after which the Tiktok administration restored the service in April on claims and assurances that the pornographic videos had been removed.