Why is there a growing unease between the govt and Big Tech in India?

The confrontation between big tech companies and the Indian government over the country’s new IT rules escalated on Tuesday after Twitter moved the Karnataka High Court challenging the IT ministry’s order to remove content and block multiple accounts on the US microblogging platform. 

According to the writ petition, which has been seen by Business Standard, Twitter contended that many of the blocking orders issued under section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, were “overbroad, arbitrary and disproportionate”, and failed to give notice to authors of the content.

It also said that some were related to political content posted by official handles of political parties, the blocking of which amounted to violation of freedom of speech. Twitter further argued that the content at issue does not have any apparent proximate relationship to the grounds under Section 69A.

Hours after the petition was filed, Minister of State for IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said all foreign internet platforms have a right to approach the courts, but they also have an unambiguous obligation to comply with local laws and rules.

Twitter would risk losing its safe harbour protection under the intermediary rules if it refuses to comply with the blocking order while its executives could face jail terms of up to seven years. 

Under the IT rules that took effect in February last year, Twitter’s Chief Compliance Officer faces criminal liability for Twitter’s non-compliance under Section 69A. Another provision requires strict confidentiality on all blocking requests from the government and actions taken by an intermediary.

[Byte of Avimukt Dar, Founding Partner, INDUSLAW]

Twitter is not the first tech company to take the government to court over the IT rules. Meta-owned messaging platform WhatsApp had approached the Delhi High Court in May last year requesting it to quash a provision that mandated companies to divulge the “first originator of information”.

WhatsApp said the traceability rule would break the very guarantees that end-to-end encryption provides and undermines peoples’ right to privacy. 

The government says that the right to privacy is not “absolute” and it is “subject to reasonable restrictions”. WhatsApp claims 500 million users in India whereas for Twitter, India is its third biggest market although estimates of its users in the country vary from 24 million to 48 million. 

Regulations shouldn’t just be fair, their enforcement must also appear to be fair. With that in mind, won’t the appearance of arbitrariness or bias in enforcement only weaken the government’s efforts to regulate big tech?