Mobilenews24x7 Bureau
There is a big spark of discontentment post the Government of India arrogates to itself the absolute power on Press Freedom and play the role of ombudsman in deciding what the media must not do.
Which has an explosive reaction from the Editors’ Guild of India describing the government’s decision taken without even a preliminary talk with the media bodies such Press Council of India or the Editors’ Guild .
That leaves the bodies as toothless as never before, who played a role in Press Freedom, have expressed anguish over the New IT Amendment Rules notified by the Ministry Of Electronics and Information Technology on April 7.
What is further disappointing is that “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 statement said.
That empowers the Government controlled PIB to decide what is fake and what is authentic. Such fact-checking role for the PIB earlier also had raised eyebrows that whether the people manning the PIB are adequately qualified to sit in judgment over the contents. Which would include the Social Media.
Who PIB?
The amended rules will give powers to the Press Information Bureau (PIB) to fact-check any ‘fake, false or misleading’ information about the central government. It can also ask social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to take down the content.
“Intermediaries who choose to keep that content will have to deal with the person who is aggrieved in a court of law. It is not mandatory that one has to take down what the notified organisation says, but then you have to deal with it in a court of law” said the ministry official.
“IT Rules said that the government of India will notify an organisation and that organisation will be a fact checker of content related to the government for all intermediaries to fight misinformation,” Chandrasekhar added.
However, the guild has put forward an argument that the notification does not mention about the fact-checking body and the governing mechanism.
“There is no mention of what will be the governing mechanism for such a fact-checking unit, the judicial oversight, the right to appeal, or adherence to the guidelines laid by the Supreme Court of India in Shreya Singhal vs Union of India case, with respect to take down of content or blocking of social media handles,” the statement said.
