India blocks Telegram till June 22 ahead of NEET re-exam: Why digital rights group calls it ‘band aid solution’? | Today’s news
India on Tuesday blocked popular messaging platform Telegram until June 22, 2026, citing its abuse by organized cheating networks ahead of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) re-examination scheduled for June 21. The shutdown, described by the government as a last resort, has drawn sharp criticism from the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), which says the regulation is legally overreaching, ineffective in practice and ultimately harmful to the very students it claims to protect.
What triggered the telegram block in India
The National Testing Agency (NTA), under the Ministry of Education, announced the blocking “in response to the organized use of the platform by fraudulent rackets to defraud candidates appearing for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test 2026 scheduled for June 21, 2026”.
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The event follows a turbulent few weeks for India’s premier entrance medical. Last month, the government canceled NEET undergraduate results for around 2.3 million students after authorities launched an investigation into allegations that questions were leaked ahead of the exam.
The cancellation sparked widespread protests across the country, including demonstrations organized by the viral Cockroach Janta Party, which publicly demanded the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
How India’s IT Act was used to justify shutting down Telegram
The block was issued under Section 69A of India’s Information Technology Act 2000, a provision that allows the central government to restrict access to online platforms in the interests of “India’s sovereignty and integrity”.
Separately, the government also ordered Telegram to disable the message editing feature for all Indian users by June 30, 2026.
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Tech giants Alphabet, Google and Apple have received government orders to temporarily remove Telegram from their respective app stores, and sources with direct knowledge of the matter have confirmed they will comply.
The government acknowledged that the measure would cause inconvenience and described it as inevitable after earlier targeted actions to remove objectionable content failed to produce the desired results.
The Internet Freedom Foundation questions the block’s legal basis
The IFF raised substantive objections to the decision, arguing that the government used a law that did not actually allow what it did.
In a detailed statement issued on Tuesday, the organization said: “Section 69A and the 2009 blocking rules contained within it allow the government to block access to specific ‘information’ on a computer resource. They are not about shutting down an entire intermediary, much less ordering a company to redesign its product by removing a feature for the entire country.”
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IFF cited the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India, which upheld Section 69A precisely because its scope was narrow and governed by procedural safeguards. The organization argued that expanding the provision to justify a complete shutdown of the platform would stretch it far beyond its constitutional boundaries. As for the separate directive regarding news editing, the IFF noted that “the release does not identify any energy source at all.”
The government’s own narrative undermines the case for the blanket bloc
One of the IFF’s sharpest arguments draws directly from the NTA’s own press release. The Foundation found that the government simultaneously admitted that channel-level containment was already in place and that there was no proof document available outside of secure channels.
The NTA release confirmed that its nodal agency “has ensured the rapid removal of a significant number of Telegram channels, groups and bots” and that this targeted work “is why the damage caused by these missiles has been contained to the extent it has been”.
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The IFF argued that this admission fatally undermines the rationale for a total ban: “If canal-level removal contained harm, the case for a blanket block collapses, and so the government reached for a heavier tool while admitting that a lighter one worked.”
Furthermore, the government’s own statement states that “there is ‘no such paper available outside the chain of secure examinations'” and that “the security of the examination is not affected by the measures taken”. The IFF concluded: “If the trial is secure and there is no information leak, what is being suppressed is rumour, and a rumor cannot justify shutting down a platform when concrete blocking and prosecution are available.”
How block harms students preparing for NEET re-examination
Apart from constitutional objections, the IFF raised practical concerns about the timing and reach of the ban, arguing that it directly harmed the interests of NEET aspirants.
“This block comes in the final days of NEET preparation when thousands of students depend on Telegram for study groups, doubt clearing and shared resources,” the organization said.
She further noted that the structural source of the test leaks lies elsewhere: “The source of the test leaks will emerge from within the system, between insiders and across the printing and logistics chain, with the platform being the most watched distribution channel. Shutting down Telegram is therefore only a distraction from the repeated failures that will continue while media attention is focused on banning Telegram.”
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The block in its technical form is also easily bypassed. The IFF noted that DNS and IP filtering at the internet service level is “overly inclusive, extensive when used legitimately, but easy to avoid when a determined exam leak moves to a VPN or mirror in minutes while ordinary users lose service for a week.”
Lack of transparency in the government’s blocking regulation
The IFF also raised serious concerns about procedural transparency, citing the Supreme Court’s 2020 judgment in Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India, which held that access-restricting orders must be made public in order to be subject to judicial review.
Read also | NTA denies claims of ‘leak’ of new NEET-UG 2026 exam paper
“Currently, only the NTA press release that recommended the block has been provided, but the reasoned order of MeitY, the body that issued it, has not been published,” the foundation noted. “A blocking notice is not a substitute for an order that an affected party may challenge.”
The organization said it remains unclear whether Telegram was even questioned under the blocking rules.
What the Internet Freedom Foundation is asking for
In its statement, the IFF outlined four specific demands to the government:
The organization asked the government to publish the MeitY Section 69A regulation and the NTA recommendation behind it, stating the reasons; provide a legal basis for the news editing directive or withdraw it; confirm whether Telegram has been heard under the blocking rules and submit the committee record to any court hearing the challenge; and scrap platform-wide restrictions in favor of targeted stopping, which the NTA itself credited with preventing damage.
“Shutting down Telegram is a band-aid solution and a disproportionate response to fraudulent trials,” the IFF said.
The foundation added: “The state cannot shut down a service used by lakhs to answer the wrongdoings of a few, and it cannot do it through an order that no one concerned can read. On its own facts, the government has done both.”
Response and current status of Telegram in India
As of 08:30 GMT on Tuesday (June 16), the Telegram app was still working in India.
NEET re-examination is scheduled on 21st June 2026. Telegram block is valid till 22nd June 2026.
