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‘Govt Has Given Itself Absolute Power’: Editors Guild ‘Deeply Disturbed’ by IT Amendment Rules

The Wire Staff

The Editors Guild of India has noted that it is deeply disturbed by the new IT Amendment Rules which have been notified by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology on April 6, 2023.

These amendments, the Editors Guild says, will have deeply adverse implications for press freedom in the country.

The new Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2023, deal with information online and the government’s powers to take them down.

Editors Guild says in its statement released on April 7 that through the new Rules, the Union government has given itself the power to constitute a “fact checking unit”, which will have sweeping powers to determine what is “fake or false or misleading”, with respect to “any business of the Central Government”, and with instructions to ‘intermediaries’ (including social media intermediaries, Internet Service Providers, and other service providers), to not host such content.

The statement is signed by president Seema Mustafa, general secretary Anant Nath, and treasurer Shriram Pawar.

“In effect, the government has given itself absolute power to determine what is fake or not, in respect of its own work, and order take down. The so called ‘fact checking unit’ can be constituted by the Ministry, by a simple “notification published in the Official Gazette”,” the statement says.

The note observes that there is no mention of what the governing mechanism for such a fact checking unit will be. Nor does it have provisions for judicial oversight, the right to appeal, or how it proposes to adhere to the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court of India in Shreya Singhal v Union of India case, with respect to the taking down of content or the blocking of social media handles.

“All this is against principles of natural justice, and akin to censorship,” the Guild says.

The statement also criticises and calls “surprising” the fact that the Ministry notified this amendment “without any meaningful consultation that it had promised” after it withdrew the earlier draft amendments it had put out in January 2023.

These proposals, on which The Wire too had reported, had given sweeping powers to the Press Information Bureau (PIB), in a move that was criticised by media organisations across the country, including the Editors Guild.

“At the outset, determination of fake news cannot be in the sole hands of the government and will result in the censorship of the press,” the Guild had said in January this year, following the release of the proposal.

As early as 2020, the website Newslaundry had highlighted several instances in which the PIB’s fact-checking unit had not actually been on the side of facts, but instead stuck to the government’s line.

“The Ministry’s notification of such draconian rules is therefore regrettable. The Guild again urges the Ministry to withdraw this notification and conduct consultations with media organisations and press bodies,” it said.

(Courtesy: The Wire.)

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PIB Gets Policing Powers in Name of Fact-Checking: DUJ

Newsclick Report

The Delhi Union of Journalists (DUJ) has strongly opposed the amendments made to the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) rules, 2021,which provides a comprehensive framework for online gaming and also deals with fact-checking of online content about the government.

“The amendments, in fact, change the very nature and mandate of the Press Information Bureau (PIB) by giving it virtual policing powers,” the DUJ said in a press statement released by its president S.K. Pande, general secretary Sujata Madhok and secretaries Jigeesh and Aroop Sen on Saturday.

According to the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY), the amendments aim to “enforce greater due diligence by online gaming and social media intermediaries in respect of online games and fake or false misleading information related to government business”.

The DUJ, however, said that the PIB has been given “unbridled regulatory powers much beyond its mandate in the name of fact-checking of “fake or false or misleading” information about the government on social media platforms.

“The PIB will now act as the new censor, which is a very dangerous situation reminiscent of the Emergency but could be worse than that,” the DUJ added.

“The mandate of the PIB is to act as an interface between the government and the media,” the statement read.

The role andfunctions of the PIB as listed on its website are “disseminating information on policies and programmes of the government of India; providing feedback on how these policies and programmes have been received; advising the government on its information, education and communication strategy; managing crisis communication and emergency response; and providing media facilitation and accreditation”, the DUJ said.

The DUJ, which considers these amendments “another attempt to curb free speech and freedom of expression”, demanded their immediate withdrawal

It called for wider consultations with all stakeholders on the menace of fake news, and a national alliance to fight such “ominous moves to curb freedom of expression and the right to dissent”.

The amended rules make it obligatory for the intermediaries not to publish, share or host fake, false or misleading information regarding any business of the Central government. These fake, false or misleading information will be identified by the Centre’s notified fact-check unit.