Hyderabad/Chandigarh, February 26: The Indian Journalists Union (IJU) has condemned the new rules of regulation for digital media put in place by the Central Government under the Information Technology Act. The Union described this attempt as a clear overreach on the part of the Government to vest itself with unlawful, unconstitutional and draconian powers to implement censorship.
In a statement issued on Friday IJU President and Secretary-General K. Sreenivas Reddy and Balwinder Singh Jammu called on the Government to immediately withdraw the IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021 which will infringe on the right to freedom of speech and thus to freedom of the media guaranteed under Article 19 in the constitution of India.
The people or the media are governed by the basic restrictions on free speech as envisaged in article 19 and the Government has no power to sit in Judgment over this matter.
The emergency powers acquired by the Government under these rules to block public access of any information that too without giving an opportunity of hearing is nothing but a blatant attempt to muzzle media with tyrannical censorship power that is clearly ultra vires of the Constitution, the Union leaders said.
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