Rishabh

Delhi Police asks X to take down IFF's account and posts. IFF will challenge the notices in court unless they are withdrawn. The Delhi Police has asked X to remove the Internet Freedom Foundation's account, six of its posts, the accounts of SFLC and @geoblockedindia, and posts by 16 other users, on the ground that they defame the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The posts document and comment on a legal notice sent in the RSS's name to IFF, SFLC and @geoblockedindia, which demanded that the three stop criticising and documenting government blocking orders. IFF received copies of the two police notices from X on the morning of 3 November 2026. IFF calls on the Delhi Police to withdraw both notices. If they are not withdrawn, IFF will challenge them in court. What has happened On 29 October 2026 at 9:54 PM, IFF, SFLC and the operator of @geoblockedindia received a two-page "legal notice" said to be issued on behalf of the RSS. It asked the three to stop opposing the government's blocking directions, stop documenting restricted content, stop posting details of geo-blocked posts, and confirm in writing within seven days that they would comply. It was signed by an unnamed "Authorised Signatory". Several RSS office-bearers have since said on X that the notice is not authentic. IFF replied to the notice, wrote to the RSS at its official address asking whether it had authorised it, and published both the notice and its reply on 30 October. On 31 October 2026 at 8:06 PM, the Special Commissioner of Police (Crime), Delhi Police, filed an "Illegal Content Report" with X (reference LD-321926). It listed two posts: IFF's post of 30 October on the notice, and SFLC post of the same day. The stated reason was that the posts are "defamatory towards the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh under Section 356 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023". The boxes for "safety/security", "defamation" and "other" were ticked. The fields for the nature of the court order and court order details were left empty. The desired action was "Remove/withhold content". On 1 November 2026, a second notice arrived in the RSS's name. It said the matter had been handed to the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad, that complaints had been filed in several states, and that requests had been made to block IFF's X account and suspend the organisations. The Delhi Police had made its first request to X the previous evening. IFF did not know this until X told it on 3 November. On 2 November 2026 at 8:51 AM, the Special Commissioner of Police (Crime) filed a second notice with X (reference LD-322956). It lists 40 URLs. Thirty-seven are posts. Three are the entire accounts of @internetfreedom, @SFLCin and @geoblockedindia. This time the boxes for "Hate speech", "defamation", "safety/security", "enforcement of court order" and "other" were all ticked. The court order fields were again left empty. The stated reason reads: "The posts constitute defamation and illegal content under Section 356 BNS. Under Rule 3(1)(d) of the IT Rules, 2021, read with Section 79(3)(b) IT Act, lawful notices require action within 3 hours." The 16 other users are @ProdctiveUseful, @PanjwaniManoj, @jidge_, @RatanSharda55, @baxiabhishek, @SchrdingersDbag, @ashleshbiradar, @seemay, @NasirHussainINC, @Being_creat_ive, @AjoyDharmavaram, @othlaw, @_ananyaaa, @AimPoojaind, @incorigibleBhai and @rraoind. Their posts, as far as IFF can tell, comment on the notice or on the notice about it. X forwarded both notice to IFF on 3 November 2026, at 8:47 AM and 10:03 AM, saying it was doing so "in the interest of transparency" and that IFF may wish to seek legal counsel and challenge the request in court. X's emails do not say that it has acted on the requests. The Delhi Police has not written to IFF, and no court has been approached, as far as the reports disclose. SFLC and @geoblockedindia have separately reported notifications from X about requests from the Uttar Pradesh Police, the Telangana Police and the Delhi Police's Cyber Crime unit, one of them against the whole of the @geoblockedindia account. IFF's position IFF condemns this legal action. A police force has made itself the enforcement arm of a private legal notice whose authenticity the organisation it names has not confirmed, and whose demand was that three organisations stop documenting censorship. The notices would deliver exactly what the notice asked for as they would also remove the accounts of the three groups in India that keep public records of what is blocked, and of who ordered it. The posts in question are about a legal notice sent to us. They quote it, criticise how it was drafted, and say that we will carry on with our work. A person who receives a threat is entitled to publish it and answer it and that is not defamation of the sender. In the three weeks before the first notice, IFF assisted 86 people whose accounts were suspended or whose posts were withheld in India. SFLC's Free Speech Tracker recorded about 268 content restrictions and 83 account restrictions in the first 29 days of October. @geoblockedindia publishes the orders behind such blocks when platforms disclose them. None of this is unlawful. Documenting censorship and challenging it in court is what the Constitution expects of citizens. IFF will not delete the posts. If the Delhi Police does not withdraw the notices, we will challenge them in court. Why the reports are unlawful Defamation is not a police matter. Section 356 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 is a non-cognizable and bailable offence. Under Section 222 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, no court can take cognizance of it except on a complaint by the person aggrieved. Under Section 174 of the BNSS, the police cannot investigate a non-cognizable offence without an order of a Magistrate. The Special Commissioner of Police (Crime) is not the person aggrieved. The notices disclose no complaint by the RSS and no order of any Magistrate. Whether a statement is defamatory is for a court to decide after hearing its author, with the defences of truth, fair comment and good faith available to that author. In Subramanian Swamy v. Union of India, (2016) 7 SCC 221, the Supreme Court upheld criminal defamation on the strength of these safeguards. A police officer who asks a platform to remove speech as defamatory has decided the question himself, without a complainant, a court or a hearing. The posts are protected comment. Exceptions 1 to 3 to Section 356(1) protect the truth published for the public good, opinion on the public conduct of public servants, and opinion on the conduct of any person touching a public question. The posts publish a notice that was sent to us and give our opinion of it. The RSS, if it sent the notice, chose to enter a public question. If it did not, the posts defame no one. Further, Section 79(3)(b) and Rule 3(1)(d) do not permit this. In Shreya Singhal v. Union of India, (2015) 5 SCC 1, the Supreme Court read down Section 79(3)(b) so that an intermediary acquires "actual knowledge" only through a court order, or a notification from the appropriate government or its agency that unlawful acts relatable to Article 19(2) are being committed. The court said that it would be difficult for intermediaries to judge the legitimacy of the millions of requests they receive, and that the burden must not be placed on them. Rule 3(1)(d), as amended in November 2025 and February 2026, now requires the intimation to come from an officer not below the rank of Joint Secretary or Deputy Inspector General, to be reasoned, and to specify the legal basis and the nature of the unlawful act, subject to a monthly review by a Secretary-level officer. The three-hour window the notice invokes applies to a lawful order that meets these conditions. A web form that ticks "hate speech" and "enforcement of court order" while leaving the court order fields blank, and that gives one sentence of reasons for 40 URLs, is not such an order. The notices by the Delhi Police are disproportionate. They seek to remove three accounts in their entirety, with years of posts, over six, four and eleven posts respectively. They sweep in 16 third parties whose only connection is that they commented on a public controversy. In Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India, (2020) 3 SCC 637, the Supreme Court held that any restriction on speech must be necessary, proportionate and the least restrictive measure available, and that orders restricting speech must be published and reasoned. Removing an organisation's entire account for criticising a legal notice fails each of these tests. The effect is to silence documentation of censorship and providing legal aid to Indian internet users. The accounts named are those that record blocking orders in India. The notice asked them to stop. A takedown request that accomplishes the demand of an anonymous private notice is not law enforcement. It is the use of state power for a private end, which Article 14 forbids. Our demands 1. To the Delhi Police: Withdraw reports LD-321926 and LD-322956 and confirm the withdrawal in writing to X and to IFF. 2. To the Delhi Police: Disclose the complaint on which the Special Commissioner of Police (Crime) acted, the authority under which the reports were filed, and whether any order of a Magistrate under Section 174 BNSS exists. Disclose every request made to any platform in this matter, including those made by the Cyber Crime unit against @geoblockedindia. 3. To X: Do not act on the reports. If any content is withheld in India, tell the affected user before acting, give them the full request, and name the legal basis. Publish both reports to the Lumen database, as the reporting form itself contemplates. 4. To the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and the Ministry of Home Affairs: Have the Secretary-level review required by Rule 3(1)(d) examine these intimations, and tell police forces that Rule 3(1)(d) is not a remedy for defamation, which the law reserves to the person aggrieved and to the courts. 5. To the RSS: State publicly whether it authorised either notice or any complaint to the police. If it did not, say so to the Delhi Police. If the notices are not withdrawn, IFF will challenge them in court. We will continue to document blocking orders, to publish them, and to provide legal assistance to anyone whose account or post is withheld in India. Nothing in these notices changes that.

Statement : The removal of BitChat from the India App Store is unconstitutional. Section 69A permits the blocking of unlawful information, not of a messenger for working during internet shutdowns. New Delhi, 3 October 2026 An Apple App Review notice published today by Jack Dorsey on X records that BitChat has been removed from the India App Store "per demand from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology", issued under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, on the ground that the application "includes content that is illegal in India". The notice adds that BitChat's TestFlight builds are no longer available for testing in India. It does not identify the content said to be illegal or the ground under Section 69A invoked. The blocking order has not been published. The Internet Freedom Foundation condemns the order and calls for its immediate publication and withdrawal. BitChat relays end-to-end encrypted messages between nearby phones over Bluetooth mesh. It has no servers and hosts no content of its own. What travels through it is the private speech of its users, so the claim that the application "includes" illegal content is incoherent. The State's actual objection stands recorded in the notices the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre issued on 23 July 2026 to GitHub, Google and Apple against BitChat, Briar and Bridgefy which stated that such applications work even during internet shutdowns and hamper lawful interception, attribution and traceability. Those notices, issued under Section 79(3)(b) were reportedly withdrawn after public disclosure. The same end has now been pursued through Section 69A. The objection is to capability of an application, not to content it transmits. A citizen's ability to speak to another citizen while the State has switched the internet off is not a ground of restriction under Section 69A or Article 19(2) of the Constitution. Section 69A survived constitutional scrutiny in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India (2015) because of its safeguards which included the need for a reasoned, recorded order, committee review, and a hearing to the originator under Rule 8 of the Blocking Rules, 2009, which the Delhi High Court enforced in Tanul Thakur v. Union of India (2022). Further, Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India (2020) requires that orders restricting fundamental rights be published and adopt the least restrictive measure. However, it appears in this instance, each safeguard has been evaded. A secret order blocking an entire application, rather than any identified unlawful information, is the most restrictive and disproprotionate measure available. Further, the confidentiality claimed under Rule 16 cannot defeat the right to challenge an order, and the constitutionality of this blocking regime is itself pending consideration before the Supreme Court. While removal from the App Store does not delete BitChat from phones, it stops new downloads and security updates, leaving existing users on unpatched versions, and it ends security testing in India through TestFlight. During the Jantar Mantar protests, when mobile internet was suspended and jammers were deployed, Bluetooth mesh messaging was a channel of last resort through which young people coordinated their safety. To our knowledge, Apple has removed BitChat on a government's demand in only one other country. This is in China, in April this year. Our demands 1. MeitY must publish the blocking order, the ground invoked and the record of the committee's proceedings, and serve the developers with a copy and an opportunity of hearing. 2. The direction must be withdrawn. Any specific unlawful use must be met with targeted proceedings under due process, not the removal of a communications tool for everyone. 3. Apple must disclose the demand in its transparency reporting and notify its users in India, and must state whether parallel directions have been received in respect of other app stores. 4. The secrecy of the blocking regime must end. The Blocking Rules, 2009 should be amended to require publication of orders and notice to originators, without awaiting the outcome of the pending constitutional challenge. The Internet Freedom Foundation will file applications under the Right to Information Act seeking a copy of the order, and stands ready to assist the developers and affected users in India.