Did you know X Enters New Censorship Battle With India, Sues Government For Content Removal

 

Elon Musk is waging a new legal battle with the Indian Government over its expanded censorship rights.

The tech mogul’s X company has filed a lawsuit for easy removal of online content. The news comes after it chose to challenge the country’s lawmakers for executing such executive orders that Musk feels go against users’ rights.

The new legal battle highlights the escalation of tensions between both parties after PM Modi ordered immediate content removal. The news also comes at a time when Musk is getting one step closer to rolling out more key offerings in the country like Tesla and Starlink.

The latest court filing argued how India’s IT ministry is requesting other departments to make use of the government’s website rolled out by the Home Affairs Ministry in 2024 to launch content-blocking orders. They similarly made a mandate where social media firms would be forced to join its website. X says that this is unlawful behavior as the orders can only be deployed over content that is harmful to the public. The fact that it took many top officials by surprise is proof of the oversight taking place.

The country’s IT ministry shared the matter with the Home Affairs ministry who are yet to provide any kind of reply in this matter. The government website is giving rise to questionable censorship which X does not approve. So it is looking forward to quashing this directive.

The company’s court papers aren’t going public and were first reported by the press on Thursday. The battle was briefly heard in the courtroom by a judge but so far, there is no decision taken over it. Now, the next session will take place next week.

Nearly four years back, X shared how it got locked in a major standoff where the Indian government ordered it to block certain tweets on the app. This had to do with a farmer’s protest against various policies of the government. Soon after that, we saw X comply and delete those after getting criticized publicly by the officials. Still, the legal decision is pending in the country’s courts.

So as you can see, tensions are escalating between Musk and the Indian government over censorship disputes.