The Indian government’s new Information Technology rules may have been sold to citizens and the world as being of a piece with global effor...
The Indian government’s new Information Technology rules may have been sold to citizens and the world as being of a piece with global efforts to rein in Big Tech and put a check on social media companies that many now see as being a danger to society. But the very first notice issued under the new rules this week gave us a glimpse of how they are actually likely to play out.
A journalist in Manipur on Monday was issued a notice, signed by a magistrate and delivered to him by the police, ordering him to “ furnish all the relevant documents showing that you ensure compliance of the provisions [of the new rules]... failing which steps as deemed fit shall be initiated without further notice”.
According to Paobel Chaoba, the journalist, the notice was a response to an online discussion uploaded on the Facebook page of The Frontier Manipur covering the new IT rules, titled “Media Under Siege: Are Journalists Walking a Tight Rope?”
A little while later, the notice was withdrawn, after Union Information and Broadcasting Secretary Amit Khare wrote to the Manipur Chief Secretary Rajesh Kumar saying such an order could only come from the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, and not from a local magistrate...
