Apar Gupta✓

RT @internetfreedom: Statement: Instagram censors a cartoon about censorship. IFF will challenge it. A cartoon on comedy, copyright and the IT Rules has been withheld in India by an automated system that cites no order and gives no reasons. On 27 October 2026, Instagram withheld in India a cartoon by Aadvik (@aaaaadvik ) who first published on 29 September 2026 as a collaborative post on the accounts of IFF, Aadvik and stand-up comedian Pulkit Mani. It shows a panicked man at a console in the image and style of the Prime Minister with red buttons marked "Censor", "Copyright" and "IT Rules", while a comic performs on a screen above him. Its caption reads, "Quick, check if comedy counts as a violation of copyright or a matter of national security." The post asked who decides what gets taken down, and on what grounds. Instagram has now answered this literally by taking it down after close to a month. Its notice says access was restricted "through an automated system implemented pursuant to legal requirements" under the IT Rules, 2021. It names no order, authority, provision or ground. There was no prior notice and no chance to respond. The same cartoon remains available on IFF's X account. The post also carried an update on Pulkit Mani v. Meta Platforms Inc. & Ors., his Delhi High Court suit over fraudulent copyright strikes on his Instagram page, in which IFF appears for him pro bono. Meta, a defendant in that suit, has now hidden a post about it from Indian users in which it is the principal defendant. In 1945, George Orwell wrote a preface to Animal Farm, a book four publishers had turned down. He noted, "the sinister fact about literary censorship in England," he observed, "is that it is largely voluntary." Unpopular ideas, he argued, could be silenced without any official ban, by institutions that guess what power wants and act first. The preface itself stayed unpublished until 1972 and in Nineteen Eighty-Four he gave this habit a machine, namely, the memory hole, a slot at the Ministry of Truth into which inconvenient records vanished, unexplained and beyond appeal. Today, the Ministry of Electronics and IT acts as this Ministry of Truth that covers up its gross incompetence in securing our cyber security by building an architecture of digital censorship that is implemented by technology platforms. It is under these IT Rules, 2021 that Instagram's "automated system" exists as a memory hole. It has swallowed a cartoon whose whole joke is a man reaching for the censor button without asking what comedy is. The absurdity Aadvik drew has now been actually demonstrated in stark reality. This machine did not build itself and in April 2026, The Hindu reported that Meta automatically restricts content flagged by government and police in India, and wants a fresh government direction before restoring anything later found lawful. MeitY's unpublished advisories of 8 and 10 October 2026 pressed platforms, and Meta by name, for "enhanced diligence". The same notice has been served on cartoonist Satish Acharya, who lost nine cartoons and then his account, on journalists covering the October protests, and days ago on comedian Kajol Srinivasan. The Union Government applies the pressure and Meta has chosen to answer it with a system that censors first and explains nothing. IFF will soon challenge Meta's automated restriction system in an appropriate legal proceeding. A joke is not a threat to the nation, and we will not let Meta’s algorithms decide otherwise. Our demands 1) Meta must restore the post in India, and tell IFF, Aadvik and Pulkit Mani which order, authority and provision it relied on, if any. 2) Meta must suspend the automated restriction of content in India and disclose the inputs on which its "automated system" acts. 3) MeitY must state whether any direction, Sahyog Portal intimation or advisory concerned this cartoon, and withdraw and publish its advisories of 8 and 10 October 2026. 4) The Union Government must restrict content only by reasoned, published orders under Section 69A or by intimations that comply with Rule 3(1)(d), and never by leaning on platforms. Speak up A memory hole works only as long as people accept it in silence. If you are a cartoonist, comic, creator or journalist whose post or account has been withheld with this notice, write to us at legal@internetfreedom.in with screenshots of every notice and we will try our best to provide you help pro-bono. Over the past 72 hours we have assisted close to 56 social media users, some of whom had their accounts restored. We are in this together!

RT @geoblockedindia: Anubhav Gupta (@anubhavgupta_ji) had an Instagram reel related to Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani withheld in India under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2026.

RT @bahudari: ⚠️ Due to the extended school holiday season in parts of India, the deadline for registration has been revised to 31 Oct 2026 Every student who registers will receive 4 books 📚 about the Constitution for free! 🥇🏆 Trip to Rashtrapati Bhavan & other exciting prizes Link 👇🏾

RT @internetfreedom: IFF statement on the geo-blocking of 26 Reddit posts in India On 21 October 2026, Reddit, Inc filed with the Lumen Database a government takedown order from India covering 26 URLs and complied, so that all 26 posts are now geo-blocked in India (Lumen notice 100411498). The notice names neither a law nor an agency, since its “Laws/Regulations” field is blank and the request is attributed only to an “Agency”. The 26 posts sit in 18 subreddits, from r/Northeastindia to r/IndianDefense and r/myanmar, and were catalogued on 24 October by @geoblockedindia in a thread that also carries images of the notice. Irrational censorship does not advance national interest Nearly all of the blocked posts concern the India–China border. They include open-source verification of PLA footage from the June 2020 Galwan clash, satellite imagery reported by Indian newsrooms, a Caravan essay, a TRT World report on Beijing’s claim over Arunachal Pradesh, maps ranging from the one China draws to users’ sketches of proposed new states, and a question put to Chinese users. Several are five or six years old, and three had already been deleted by their authors. IFF condemns this order as secret, disproportionate and unlawful. We do not dispute that the State may act against speech that genuinely endangers the defence of India, such as troop positions, operational plans, the identities of serving personnel or a hostile state’s coordinated information operation, and the twenty soldiers who died at Galwan deserve a country that takes its border seriously. Nothing on this list is of that kind, because every item was already public, whether released by the PLA, reported by Indian newsrooms or posted by ordinary users. Post 14 describes Indian soldiers holding off an armoured vehicle with sticks, stones and helmets, and their courage is not a secret, nor is there any reason to make it one. Arunachal Pradesh is part of India and the country asserts that position with confidence, so it has no need to hide from its own citizens the map that Beijing draws, which they need to know in order to answer. Censoring Indian's discussion of the dispute does nothing to weaken China’s position and hands Chinese state media a ready story about Indian censorship. Two of the blocked posts, numbers 11 and 13, were themselves objecting to wrong maps, while others are users’ sketches of proposed new states. The secrecy surrounding the order protects no one but the official who signed it. Whether this was a direction under Section 69A and the Blocking Rules, 2009, or a notice under Section 79(3)(b) routed through the Sahyog portal, it fails the tests the Supreme Court has set. Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) 5 SCC 1 upheld Section 69A only because the 2009 Rules require written reasons, a hearing under Rule 8 and review under Rule 14, and none of these safeguards was observed here. A restriction must also be necessary and the least restrictive means available, and this order is neither, since blocking six-year-old threads answers no present danger, blocking posts already deleted shows that nobody examined the list, and blocking entire threads silences commenters nobody considered. How Reddit works Reddit is a federation of tens of thousands of communities known as subreddits, each created by users and run by unpaid volunteer moderators, while Reddit, Inc itself handles legal demands. Reddit says that content named in a government request is checked first against its own rules and then against local and international law, including human rights standards, before access is restricted in the requesting country, after which a reader in India sees a restriction notice while everyone else, including anyone in India using a VPN, still sees the post (Reddit Transparency Report, July–December 2025). Because each post sits at a fixed URL with a threaded discussion beneath it, a block by URL hides the whole thread, including every reply beneath it, and r/Northeastindia has lost seven threads about its own borders for readers in India while a reader in Shanghai can still open them. The moderators who built these forums receive no notice and have no appeal, and the only public record of the order is the notice Reddit chose to send to Lumen. Takedowns on Reddit are rising India is now the second-largest source of the government takedown demands that Reddit receives. Between July and December 2025, Reddit received 169 such requests from 28 countries, of which India sent 21, second only to the UAE (Reddit Transparency Report, July–December 2025), up from fewer than ten in all of 2019. The demands have also grown bolder, as a 2025 order relayed through Pune Police named 825 posts about a matrimonial service and warned of a countrywide ban if Reddit did not comply, yet Reddit refused and the court agreed with it. Across all platforms, published analysis puts MeitY’s blocking orders at about 12,600 in 2024 and 24,300 in 2025. On 21 October 2026, Reddit complied with all 26 URLs without any public challenge. Our demands 1. MeitY and the originating agency must publish the order, the provision invoked and the reasons for each URL. 2. The order must be withdrawn and access restored, and any post said to be unlawful must first go through notice and a hearing under Rule 8. 3. The Review Committee under Rule 14 must examine the order and publish its finding. 4. If the order came through the Sahyog portal, the Government must say so and stop using Section 79(3)(b) against speech while the courts decide its legality. 5. MeitY must disclose how many Reddit URLs it has had blocked since 2024, and on what grounds.

Eagles, Vultures and Other Animals at the Supreme Court

RT @humorosaurus: Extra lights at Safdarjung's tomb today.

RT @BeechBazar: कुलदीप नैयर पत्रकारिता सम्मान के विजेता

RT @nandinisundar: The language of 'prayers' and 'Mylord' has lulled the judges into thinking of themselves as deities making oracular pronouncements, instead of seeing themselves as working judges, paid by taxpayers to read & assess evidence and arguments. See this article:

RT @captn3m0: If you'd like to start an #emudhra competitor in India, a CCA license requires 50 crores for companies and 5 crores for Individuals/firms. The rest of the guidelines are at

RT @whattalawyer: A big shoutout to Advocate Abhik Chimni and his entire team, including Pranjal Abrol, Moksha Sharma , and Kartik Venu, for their invaluablesupport. Heartfelt thanks to Advocates Abhisht Hela, Pushp Sharma and Angad for handling SEM court since day one. Advocate Shivangi Sharma for standing by me and helping me. Last but certainly not least, my sincere gratitude to the seniors (& their teams) in the profession who guided us with their valuable legal-inputs and instructions.

If liberty is indeed sacrosanct, then who will answer my prayer?

RT @AnantGuptaAG: In this interview, Justice Muralidhar: 👉🏽debunks the notion that CJP leaders made a mistake by signing peace bonds 👉🏽asks what if Ranka and Das were rickshaw pullers 👉🏽calls the bluff on the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita Read:

A statutory revision or appeal against an order may not always provide an effective or timely remedy. In such cases, the High Court may exercise its writ jurisdiction, as well as its inherent powers under criminal procedure to prevent the abuse of court processes. This is particularly where the impugned order is palpably illegal and likely to be extended. Procedural rules, statutory provisions and judgments may be cited to argue otherwise. But, as any litigator will candidly acknowledge, much ultimately depends on whether the writ court chooses to exercise or decline its jurisdiction in the circumstances of each case. My limited opinion is that the writ powers are sufficiently broad and need to be exercised in cases concerning the illegal deprivation of personal liberty.

The government has discontinued (for now) selling vehicle data to private companies. Happy Dussehra!

On 22 September 2026, IFF filed RTI applications with MoRTH and NIC asking who has access to VAHAN, SARATHI, e-Challan and PUCC data. NIC’s reply of 16 October discloses that 25,314 credentials were issued to private entities and that 17.08 million queries were run through them in 33 months. It also says private sharing was discontinued from 1 October 2026 on MoRTH’s directions, a decision we have found announced nowhere. (1/8) Read More:

RT @himansshhi: 🚨An audit has found that ECI’s ECINET portal has a Bengal-specific restriction that could prevent EROs in West Bengal from accessing two features available to officers in other states: voter enumeration form details and the notice-and-hearing dashboard. @htTweets

RT @PTI_News: VIDEO | Delhi: On the two-day extension of judicial custody for Cockroach Janta Party leaders Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, Advocate Abhik Chimni says, "Today, when we reached the court, the five-day custody period had ended. On the last date of hearing, the court had stated that it did not find the sureties legitimate enough to be accepted. Today, we produced fresh sureties and brought them to court. When our matter was taken up, the State filed a fresh application, which was served on us at that point. In this application, they sought a further five to seven days of judicial custody. The reasons they gave were absolutely shocking to us. They claimed there was an imminent threat to public order and public tranquillity and that, therefore, the accused needed to remain in judicial custody... It is very unfortunate, and everyone must remember that there is currently no FIR against my clients in connection with this issue. This concerns preventive custody. They have been detained out of fear that they might go and protest. There is no FIR, no pending case against them in this matter, and no investigation for which they need to be questioned. This is absolutely appalling and deeply disturbing. I cannot remember the last time people were kept in preventive custody under such circumstances. We will pursue the matter legally, but this has been hugely disappointing for all of us." (Full video available on PTI Videos -

People can have differences and nuanced takes on CJP but it is inexcusable to remain silent on the custody of Ashutosh and Saurav. This is an egregious violation of a citizen's liberty. Please speak up. If not on principle, than in self-interest, for this is setting a precedent.

To any reasonable person, keeping Ashutosh and Saurav in custody can only be meant to break their spirit, and through it, to instil fear in peaceful protesters. I regret to say that this is not about the law. It is about placing a price on the exercise of constitutional rights.

RT @Saurabh_MLAgk: Police tweets have become like PM Modi’s Bhashan – just rhetoric, no substance. Which information is incorrect? Did police forcibly cut the electric connection at CR Park Durga Puja? I called your SHO and he said he does not know the officially notified cut-off time. Is it a joke? If permitted time is 12 AM, why were Puja Committee members harassed and humiliated before that cut-off? If official time is 10 pm, why did BJP-backed Ramlila continue beyond 12 am? Govt cannot send paramilitary force into Puja Pandal to heckle organisers.

Clarification: Recent claims regarding the CR Park Durga Puja pandal are incorrect. Police intervention is only to ensure court rules on noise pollution. The organisers kept playing loud music past the permitted time, despite agreeing to the rules in earlier meetings. Delhi Police is committed to safe festivities for all. We urge everyone to cooperate for peaceful and safe festivities.

The prolonged judicial custody of Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das cannot be justified in law. I hope they are released without any further delay and more people speak up in their support.