Social media platforms can be blocked in entirety under Section 69A of IT Act: Delhi HC rules in Telegram case

While upholding the Central government's decision to temporarily block Telegram, the Delhi High Court on Friday ruled that the government can block access to an entire application or a platform under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act). .The provision lays down the procedure for blocking public access to any "information" through any computer resource in the interests of national security, sovereignty, public order, or related concerns, following prescribed procedures and recorded reasons. Intermediaries that fail to comply with such blocking orders can face up to 7 years’ imprisonment and a fine.Justice Tejas Karia said that there is no reason to exclude the application or a platform from the ambit of expression "information" contained in Section 2(1)(v) of the IT Act. "The breadth of the said definition indicates that the expression “information” is required to be construed expansively. A restrictive construction, confining the expression only to individual user accounts, channels, images, posts, files or messages, would unduly narrow the scope of Section 69A and may render the provision otiose. The legislative intent, therefore, appears to be to confer a broad and technologically neutral meaning upon the expression “information”," the Court said. .It also referred to the definition of "computer resource" and said that it is evident that the information generated, transmitted, received, stored, or hosted to the software-based infrastructure falls within the ambit of Section 69A of the IT Act. "An application or platform performs logical, arithmetic and memory functions through electronic, magnetic or optical impulses, and includes input, output, processing, storage, computer software and communication facilities connected with a computer system or computer network. Accordingly, this Court is of the view that Respondent No. 1 was empowered under Section 69A of the IT Act to issue directions for blocking public access to Telegram," the Court concluded..Delhi High Court upholds temporary ban on Telegram till June 22.The observations assume significance since Telegram had argued that Section 69A of the IT Act only empowers the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology of India (MEITY) to block access to "information” and that this power cannot be extended to a blanket power to block entire social media intermediaries. However, it was the government's stand that the definition of "information" includes the intermediaries/platforms. .In its detailed judgement, the Court ruled that the temporary blocking of Telegram until June 22 and the disabling of its message-editing feature until June 30 were proportionate measures aimed at preventing misinformation and criminal activity related to the NEET-UG 2026 examination.It also noted that Telegram’s architecture enables rapid and large-scale dissemination of content through channels, groups, bots, cloud-based storage and username-based anonymity.The Court observed that unlawful content can quickly spread and create public order concerns. It further found that merely removing specific channels or bots was ineffective because operators could easily create mirror channels and migrate subscribers.The message-editing feature could also be misused to falsely suggest that exam papers had been leaked before the examination, the Court added."Therefore, it is evident that narrower measures, including the takedown of specific bots and channels, were ineffective having regard to the particular nature and architecture of the Telegram platform," the Court observed..MEITY had issued a direction under Section 69A, restricting access to the Telegram platform in India till June 22. It also directed the platform to disable, till June 30, the message-editing feature for messages already posted.Telegram challenged the order, arguing that the government has singled it out while other social media intermediaries continue to operate without restriction, violating Article 14 of the Constitution of India.The company stated that it held multiple meetings with government agencies from May onwards and submitted detailed responses outlining both proactive and reactive moderation measures.Telegram stated that after receiving specific URLs from authorities on June 9, it removed the flagged content within an hour. The company also claimed to have taken down more than 900 links related to unlawful NEET content and deployed artificial intelligence, machine learning tools and manual moderation to identify violations..[Read Judgement]