New Delhi, Feb 23 (IANS): A Delhi High Court judge on Wednesday recused himself from hearing pleas by Google and social media giants Facebook and Twitter challenging a single-judge order asking them to globally remove links to a video containing defamatory contents against yoga guru.

As the matter came up for hearing, Justice Vipin Sanghi recused himself from the bench.

The bench, also comprising Jasmeet Singh, slated the matter for further hearing on March 21 before another bench excluding Justice Sanghi.

Earlier in November 2019, a single-judge bench of the Delhi High Court had directed Facebook to globally remove, block or disable links to a video containing defamatory allegations against yoga guru Ramdev. The court order had come while hearing a plea by Ramdev seeking global restraint order against Facebook, Google, it's subsidiary YouTube, and Twitter from carrying content related to a book.

The IT giants had said that while they have no objection to blocking the URLs and disabling the same, insofar as access in India is concerned, they were opposed to removal/blocking/disabling the defamatory content on a global basis.

In the last hearing, Facebook's counsel had requested the court to restrain Ramdev from initiating contempt action against it till the appeal was pending.