The government has sanctioned prosecution of 21 IT companies, including giants Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Yahoo on grounds that material carried on their webpages violates provisions of Indian law, promotes enmity between classes and constitutes a threat to national integration. If convicted, executives of these companies could face imprisonment and fines. The Judge hearing the case has said these sites could also be blocked.
Is the increased focus on content carried by Social Networking and other sites an attempt to clean up the lawless Internet or is it an attempt to censor free speech?
You Decide!
Comment Now!
Two best comments will win one year’s free subscription to eGov Magazine
You must be logged in to post a comment Login
This will be an interesting test of the restrictions that can be put on the Internet in India. Will India also start blocking sites like China, as the Judge observed? Or will free speech win the day? Let's wait and watch
Anand Agarwal
January 17, 2012 at 7:23 pm
As always, here also two side of a coin- 1. Govt. shall to restrict such giant companies to promote enmity over the internet by some of other way and 2. What about the freedom of speech as it's a birth right of an Indian citizen? I look forward to hear the decision in the matter.
AP75
January 18, 2012 at 4:31 pm
Can Indian Government screen all public places for terrorists and explosive devices. If it can keep India free from terror attacks for the next 5 years, let it ban Facebook for 10 years.
Dhirendra Pratap Singh
January 18, 2012 at 4:49 pm
I do not know why India can not block all the adult sites and adult literature if viewing and reading the adult literature is an offence. Prevention is better than cure. Why can't these pronographic sites be blocked at the Internet gateway of India level itself. One such example can be known from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. KSA blocks more than 90% of the pornographic material (English and Arabic). Some how it could not do for the sites from local languages of several countries. So Indian government can certainly take these measure instead of freely allowing and then making law enforcement on those illegal viewers. It is foolish to expect by the government that every citizen should be aware of all the legal laws of the government, instead they can curb these activities at the basic level itself by taking Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's case as example.
Tgk Vasista
January 18, 2012 at 6:57 pm
@TGK Vasista, should India really follow the model of a country like Saudi Arabia? The issue here is not limited to adult sites, it is about the very freedom of speech itself. As the Chinese saying goes, be careful about what you wish for, it might just come true. I for one would definitely not want India to follow Saudi Arabia of all countries.
Coming to your point about people not being aware of the laws, that should not be an excuse for the government to assume powers of deciding what we get to read and say on the Internet. In the garb of legal provisions, the power of democracy must not be suppressed. Please take a look at the history of the world. Dissent and the feeling of not being satisfied with the status quo has been the spark that has ignited countless tales of progress and revolution.
Anand
January 18, 2012 at 9:28 pm
Dear Anand, I never said India has to completely follow the model of Saudi Arabia, but when there is a good item that can be adoptable then why not and just because one attribute is followed does not mean it is completely following the model of the country. What happens if this kind of wish come true such as banning pornography. In fact by this we are giving chances to police and lawyers to get much more corrupted while handling cyber crimes. Citizen are like children and government is like parent, parent has every right not to get the children to expose to such illegal and illicit content. So I still feel that these type of content can be curbed at the Internet Gate way level at different levels of governance-National, State and Local. Banning illegal content does not infringe fundamental rights such as freedom of expression. Abuses and curses are not acceptable to any human if it is delivered to one individual by another individual in the name of freedom of express. We can Comment on one's work but not the individual until unless there is a strong evidence.
Tgk Vasista
February 3, 2012 at 1:19 pm
Dear TGK, "Citizen are like children and government is like parent"? Sorry sir, I do not feel the same way. Being in power does not bestow upon an individual the right to decide what I talk and what I read. The government is definitely not my parent. Citizens are not answerable to the government, it is the other way round. And in any case, who decides what is "illegal and illicit content"? If we continue being so casual about our freedoms, some day someone might think this very debate is illegal. What then? Better that the government focus on governance and leave moral policing to our conscience and good judgement. Who decides when criticism becomes abuse? Why cannot we comment on an individual if that individual is having a deleterious impact on the public interest? Who decides what criticism of an individual's work is not a criticism of the individual? Slippery slope, my friend. Let's not go there.
Anand
February 5, 2012 at 3:31 pm
Dear Anand, every coin has two sides: Please read the below:
Privacy becomes an important element of discussion because Privacy is considered to be one of the fundamental human right (Cavoukian, 1999; Ruiter and Warnier, 2011). Privacy is a fundamental human right recognized in the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights and in many other international and regional treaties. In many of the countries where privacy is not explicitly recognized in the constitution such as the United States, Ireland and India, the courts have found that right in other provisions (Refer to the link: http://gilc.org/privacy/survey/intro.html)
Sir, Why do you think that privacy is not explicitly recognised in the constitution in US, Ireland and India? Our laws are mostly inherited from US and UK. Of course there could be some legal provisions that require arguments. But is it worth to go for such arguments just for the sake of browsing such illegal content. Some argue that it generates revenue. But it is our wisdom and culture that should say and decide whether the revenue could be generated with the culture of practicing prostitution or by doing labor work.
TGK Vasista
February 7, 2012 at 12:55 pm
@Anand, According to Dr. Gulshan Rai, CERT, India, no country has implemented a true government cloud so far due to complex legal issues. It is because the three aspects such as privacy, security and right to information are like three vertices of a triangle. If someone wants privacy, one should compromise on security and compromise on the right to information and vice versa. According to me, also the right to freedom of expression. So it is required to strike a balance and for that a lot of maturity and awareness is required. Currently it remains as a challenge to governance (eGov Magazine, Feb 2011).It is because the three aspects such as privacy, security and right to information are like three vertices of a triangle. If someone wants privacy, one should compromise on security and compromise on the right to information and vice versa. So it is required to strike a balance and for that a lot of maturity and awareness is required. Currently it remains as a challenge to governance (eGov Magazine, Feb 2011).
TGK Vasista
February 7, 2012 at 1:26 pm
The freedom of expression as guaranteed by the constitution of India in Article 19 is also subjected to reasonable restrictions which is genuinely followed by other means of mass communication like the electronic and print media. The social newtworking sites cannot be exempted from this provision just because of their content being generated by masses. Since they always remove objectionable content as that related to child pornography and pre-natal sex without fail, they cannot offer the excuse of being unable to do anything about this matter just because it generates a large number of hits and hence huge chunks of revenue.
Shiva Tripathi
January 19, 2012 at 2:39 pm
Just look at the furore created by SOPA and PIPA! Can the Internet ever be regulated? The answer is no because the Internet is self regulating. Let us face it contrary opinions, hate material, pornography, plagiarism and piracy are not discoveries of the Internet. They have existed from the time of the recorded word, music, painting and photography. Technology is always a game changer. When the printed page was invented by Gutenberg the monks rose up in arms as their job was threatened. Look at the Internet as yet another new technology. It is bound to bring changes which will threaten old technologies and technologists. Censorship is old technology. It was meant for another age another technological epoch. We need a new approach to these age old issues and therefore new laws which understand the technologies and their uses and their misuses and protects Society from the misuse. Perhaps Creative Commons and Copyleft show the way.
Arup
January 19, 2012 at 3:19 pm
Internet restrictions lead to the rise of local social media companies in China. On the other hand, Indian internet explosion has exponentially increased revenues of Google and Facebook from India. It has not benefited Indian social media companies.
Will these restrictions help Indian social media companies in their growth?
Ravi Gupta
January 19, 2012 at 5:55 pm
This is a blatant attempt at censorship. In a liberal and democratic society the government should act as a protector of people's right to speak their mind. We don't expect the government to start censoring views of different members of the public.
Moreover, by censoring views that are in the social space we will end up giving more popularity to the absurd and the ridiculous. In the Internet based society, censored views often end up gaining more prominence.
Anoop V.
January 19, 2012 at 6:04 pm
Censorship is not a solution. A friend sent me a link to the e-copy of Satanic Verses! Freedom of expression does not mean freedom to hurt. Globalisation implies a global audience and therefore a global sensitivity. Jay Leno's comment was flippant. In another age and time such flippancy would be enjoyed and forgotten. Today the comment spreads to the globe in a flash and irritates people. In my childhood I had golliwogs as toys.The origin of golliwog is extremely insulting to Indians. It stood for Westernised Oriental Gentleman or WOG and the Golli was added as a mark of derision Golly a WOG. We speak of the vernacular press. Do you know that the word comes from the Latin Verna – a slave. Vernacular is thus the slaves language. But we use these terms comfortably because their origin is forgottem. The British have cleaned up stories with references to Golliwogs (see new Enid Blyton story reprints). Why not the same sensitivity elsewhere?
Arup
January 27, 2012 at 1:01 pm