When the Parliament’s budget session re-opens on April 24, the Rajya Sabha will vote on an annulment motion against the IT Rules promulgated in April 2011 that provide for “intermediaries” to remove the online content they are asked to by anyone. The motion has been moved by P Rajeeve, Rajya Sabha member from the Communist Party of India-Marxist.
Speaking on the phone from Thrissur, Rajeeve said, “The IT Rules go against the Fundamental Rights of the Constitution and against the principles of natural justice which are the foundation of our criminal justice system. The rules ask intermediaries to remove content without giving the content owner an opportunity to defend it. They will cause private censorship.”
The Left parties have decided to back the motion and efforts are on to mobilise members of Parliament across party lines. If the motion is accepted by the Rajya Sabha, it will be sent to the Lok Sabha, probably in the monsoon session.
The Bharatiya Janata Party is yet to take an official position on the annulment motion. The BJP’s Arvind Gupta, who heads its national IT cell, has in the past said his party believes in freedom of speech and is opposed to any move that will “infringe upon the right to freedom of expression through the back door and any move that curtails innovation.”
Also supporting the motion is independent MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar who has been vocal on the issue. Back in December, he had raised it in the Rajya Sabha, saying, “I urge the government to exercise utmost caution about imposing any such restrictions on online publishing. The government must call for a transparent public consultation / public opinion thereon and involve the blogging community before finalising and implementing these rules for publication and implementing them.”
Kumar Deepak Das of the Asom Gana Parishad and Mahendra Mohan of the Samajwadi Party also opposed internet censorship in the Rajya Sabha in December.
The IT Rules provide for a mechanism whereby anyone can send any “intermediary” (website, server, domain registrar, blog owner, etc) a notice to remove any content within 36 hours, failing which the complainant can file a first information report. A test of these rules by the Bengaluru-based Centre for Internet and Society showed that website owners big and small chose to remove content rather than face legal action.
In December, it was using these rules that the Maharashtra police got a domain registrar to delete the domain name http://www.cartoonsagainstcorruption.com, owned by Aseem Trivedi, a cartoonist who had put up that website in support of the Anna Hazare-led Lokpal movement.
Industry is not too happy about the IT Rules either. The Internet and Mobile Association of India has written to Communications Minister Kapil Sibal on the need to reconsider the rules. Says Subho Ray of Internet and Mobile Association of India, “We have asked them to clarify what exactly we are expected to do in 36 hours of receiving a take-down notice and also, who can send such a notice. Everybody can’t be an affected party.”
Software body NASSCOM is also believed to have written to the government expressing its apprehension that these rules will cause large-scale censorship in the Indian internet space and prohibit online innovation and content creation from India.
Mishi Choudhary of SFLC.in, a Delhi-based internet rights advocacy organisation that has been lobbying with the government to reconsider the rules, says, “The government needs to come back to the drawing table, speak to all stakeholders and make a fresh set of transparent and workable rules.”
(First published in Rediff.)
See also:
- PRS Legislative Research: Analysis of IT Rules, 2011
- Go here to directly write to Rajya Sabha MPs from your state in a few clicks
- Sign this petition to all Rajya Sabha MPs at Change.org
- Aseem Trivedi’s Save Your Voice campaign
From Kafila archives:
- Happy Kapil Sibal’s Day
- SFLC.in’s FAQ: All you wanted to know about IT Rules 2011
- How India Makes E-books Easier to Ban than Books (And How We Can Change That): Pranesh Prakash
- How India Censors Without Being Seen: Pranesh Prakash
- Bhopal, Media and a Training Manual: Shalini Sharma
- Why ban just a Facebook page when you can easily erase a holy book or two (or more)?
- The Absurd Tyranny of iSibal: Vrinda Gopinath
- What Kapil Sibal does not understand: the internet
- Kapil Sibal is an Idiot
- Your government is removing your YouTube videos and you don’t even know about it
- The Day India Will Shut Down the Internet
- Here’s what India’s Communications and IT Minister thinks about online freedom
- Get Ready for India’s Blogger Control Act
- Crazy internet censorship time in India, again
Rajeev advance wishes to make success in the Rajyasabha to save the freedom expression. This is right time. People must involve. This annulment was proposed to save Corporates must be expposed
LikeLike
Save our Freedom..
LikeLike
सिब्बल जी दा वी जवाब नयीं
इस देश में जहां एक इंसान की भावनाएं सिर्फ इसलिए आहत हो जाती हैं
क्योंकि किसी दूसरे इंसान ने अपना मुंह खोलने की हिम्मत की है
ऐसे देश में ऐसा लाजवाब कानून ला कर क्या हासिल करना चाहते हैं मंत्री महोदय
सिर्फ येही न के
इन्टरनेट ने अपनी बात बेझिजक कहने के जो रास्ते खोलने शुरू किये हैं
उनपर बड़े बड़े सरकारी ताले लगा दिए जाएँ
ताके उन सब के अधिकारों की रक्षा हो सके जिन के पास सारे अधिकार हैं
और वो जो निराधिकार हैं
वो अपने अधिकारों के हक में बोल पाने के सपने देखना भी बंद क्र दें
तुसी ग्रेट हो सिब्बल जी
यह देश आपके सम्मुख नत मस्तक है
LikeLike
Couldn’t have said it better.
LikeLike