The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought the response of the Central government on a petition filed by instant messaging platform Telegram challenging the decision to ban its operations in India till June 22 in view of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test undergraduate (NEET-UG) re-exams. The matter will be heard at 2:30 PM tomorrow.
Justice Tejas Karia ordered,"Issue notice. Notice is accepted. We have heard the learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner as also learned SG Tushar Mehta. Respondents are at liberty to file their reply along with all the documents." Appearing for the Central government, Solicitor General (SG) Tushar Mehta submitted at the outset, "This is order under Section 69A (of the IT Act)."
Explaining how paper leaks were being facilitated through Telegram, the SG said,"I have to show individual information, individual user ids. They were repeatedly called and told that these are issues and you correct your system. But they failed to do it. I have given examples and shared with them. There are many channels. What is being projected and what is being circulated is that if you give me this much amount, I will give you 5 questions. This is continuous."
Appearing for Telegram, Senior Advocate Dhruv Mehta submitted,"Look at the impugned order. There is complete non application of mind. Exercise started by Ministry from June 1. Meetings have happened there is correspondence from both sides. They supply to me list of various channels, I have implemented that. There is no whisper of those communications in the government's order."
Pressing for the matter to be heard tomorrow, the SG said,"Overnight nothing is going to happen. If my lords keep it tomorrow, there is something shocking that I will show."The Telegram lawyer then said that the law permits blocking of particular information, not the entire platform.He went on to say that there are no grounds in the government order for blocking the platform, something the SG disputed. SG Mehta then claimed that the government has substantial material.
In its writ petition, Telegram argues that the government has singled it out while other social media intermediaries continue to operate without restriction, violating Article 14 of the Constitution of India.
The company states that it held multiple meetings with government agencies from May onwards and submitted detailed responses outlining both proactive and reactive moderation measures.Telegram stated that after receiving specific URLs from authorities on June 9, it removed the flagged content within an hour. The company also claimed to have taken down more than 900 links related to unlawful NEET content and deployed artificial intelligence, machine learning tools and manual moderation to identify violations.
Pertinently, the government temporarily banned the messaging platform, citing concerns that it had been used by organised cheating networks involved in the NEET-UG controversy. The decision followed the cancellation of the original NEET examination after allegations of widespread paper leaks and irregularities.The government has described the measure as necessary to protect the integrity of the re-examination scheduled for 21 June. Authorities argued that Telegram channels were being used to distribute leaked or fake question papers, coordinate fraud and manipulate message timestamps through the platform’s editing feature.
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