'Social media can be used by a person just like a gun in his hand, observed the Supreme Court on Friday as it found favour with an order asking a Congress leader from Uttar Pradesh to stay away from social media for at least 18 months. The top court has decided to formulate guidelines on use of social media in criminal cases, especially in matters of bail. "What is wrong with an order asking you not to use social media? If a court can order an accused to stay away from a gun, it can similarly ask you to stay away from social media," said Chief Justice of India SA Bobde...'
'The woman booked for a social media post questioning the lack of transparency in the government’s response to the gas leak which killed 12 people in Visakhapatnam earlier this month says that she is being targeted for raising basic humanitarian concerns. In a move that is being seen as a blatant attack by the Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy government on the right to free speech, the Andhra Pradesh police registered a case against the 60-year-old resident of Guntur on May 19, calling her Facebook post ‘objectionable’...'
'A case of sedition has been registered against a young man for allegedly making ‘objectionable remarks’ on Facebook about Uttar Pradesh chief minister Adityanath, the Indian Express reported... The FIR alleges, “Rajesh Kumar Shukla, a resident of Allahabad, had said in his Facebook post ‘I do not understand why Priyanka Gandhi Vadra did not hire Uttar Pradesh Transport Corporation buses for migrant laborers?’ On this post, a resident of Allahabad, Anoop Singh, made objectionable remarks against Yogi Adityanath. He said, “Yogi kutta hai is liye (because Yogi is a dog).”...'
'Tansen Tiwari, a veteran journalist from Gwalior district in Madhya Pradesh, has been booked by the police for referring to Bharatiya Janata Party leaders as gappu (braggart) and tadipar (externed) in a social media post on Sunday. The Gwalior police registered the case after a local BJP leader and advocate, Awdhesh Singh Bhadauria, reported the matter to the Gola Ka Mandir police station on his party’s letterhead...'
'In continuation of the ongoing prohibitory orders that have been in place in Mumbai city for close to three decades, the Mumbai Police Commissionerate has issued another order on May 23. This time the order, along with regulations on social media usage, has also called for a complete gag on persons speaking against the state government’s functioning... The police have claimed that the order was issued to deal with the “animosity created in the state due to COVID-19 pandemic”.
'At least six journalists have been booked by Himachal Pradesh police for comments and ground reports on problems being faced by migrant labourers, businesses and citizens during the COVID-19 lockdown. According to a report on Newslaundry, the reasons behind these cases filed against the journalists ranged from their reporting on hunger among migrant workers, lack of proper food distribution, to their social media activity which involved sharing reports of other newspapers, to criticising the district administration for laxity in areas such as quarantining inter-state travellers...'
'The Madhya Pradesh police has booked five persons, including three minors, for posting a Facebook comment on Union agriculture and farmers welfare minister Narendra Singh Tomar mocking the incorrect way in which he was wearing a face mask. All the accused – Ajay Pratap Singh Sikarwar, Aman Singh, and minors AB, XX and YY* – are residents of Jaura village in Morena, which the Union minister represents in the Lok Sabha...'
'Zubair Ahmed, a journalist working in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, has been arrested allegedly for a tweet asking why a family was put under quarantine for speaking over phone to a COVID-19 patient.
'On rare occasions, the Indian government—which prides itself on visions of universal digital literacy, online services, and biometrical identity schemes—still conducts certain official communications by radiogram. An operator sitting at a radio transmitter taps out a message, and then a receiver spits out the transmission in another part of the country, generating an instant legal document.
'A district court lawyer in Kanpur was arrested on the charge of sedtion for retweeting a video of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and calling him a terrorist on Sunday. The man, Abdul Hannan, commented on a tweet by State Information Department’s Media Advisor Shalabh Mani Tripathi on Saturday. The tweet by Tripathi had a video of Adityanath’s Vidhan Sabha speech supporting cane charge on people protesting against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC)...'
