Fact-Check Unit Notification: Bad In Law, Will Suppress Freedom Of Media
Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator. Author of Cyber Scams in India, Digital Arrest, The Money Trap and The Human Hack
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By Sunil Garodia
First publised on 2023-04-08 03:35:21
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Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator. Author of Cyber Scams in India, Digital Arrest, The Money Trap and The Human Hack
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The Editorâs Guild has rightly condemned the government notification on amendments to the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules. These amendments have been termed draconian by the Guild as they seek to arm the government with powers to establish a fact-check unit that will flag any news item related to the central government that it considers "fake or false or misleading". The powers and jurisdiction of the fact-check unit are wide, the terms have not been well-defined and it has also not been notified what is the remedy against the unit's decision. This makes the unit all-powerful and once it flags a news item as fake, false or misleading (which terms are open to mischievous interpretations), digital media will have to take it down immediately. This will become a handy tool for the government to suppress unpalatable news (which can always be flagged as 'misleading') and will amount to putting fetters on the media.
The government had come out with the draft rules that were almost similar to the amendments now affected in January this year. At that time, all media organizations had criticized the those rules and had advised the government to consult with media bodies before bringing in the law. But the government has gone ahead with the same rules without having any discussion with media bodies. This is autocratic and an assault on media freedom.
The fact-check unit has been made all-powerful and its word will be the last. There is no defined mechanism to appeal against its decision. This is bad in law. It is also against the principle that a person cannot be the judge in his or her own case. The government alone cannot decide what is published is fake, false and especially misleading as being an interested party, it will likely suppress news that it does not want to come out in public domain. In any case, it always has the right to deny such news and media outlets are duty bound to publish the denial with the same prominence as they published the original news. Even if the government feels the need for a fact-check unit, it has to be broad-based (with representations from media), its powers need to be well defined and there must be a mechanism to appeal against its orders.
