BREAKING: Delhi High Court Upholds Decision To Temporarily Ban Telegram Ahead of NEET Exams

[00:00:00]What the maker of the app has said.

[00:00:01]>> a lot thanks a lot for all the details, but we have a very big breaking news development that we are getting right now. We'll move to that breaking news.

[00:00:07]This is Delhi High Court upholds the ban on Telegram, ladies and gentlemen. This is significant. This is huge and Delhi High Court dismisses plea against Telegram ban and Delhi High Court clearly says that center has the power and upholds center's powers [music] under the IT Act and center's ban on Telegram till June 22 to stay. This is huge. This is significant. Delhi High Court upholds the ban on Telegram. This is significant big breaking news development that we are getting right now. We'll get you more details. Delhi High Court has rejected Telegram's plea challenging the central government's decision to temporarily ban Telegram before the NEET exams because Telegram was a medium which was used in uh sharing the leaked papers. Now government's order is well-founded. A platform can be banned under section 69A of the IT Act. Now this comes from Justice Tejas Kariya. Uh and this has been ruled by Justice Tejas Kariya. Big breaking news development that we are getting right now. The Delhi High Court upholds the temporary ban on Telegram.

[00:01:06][music] Telegram's petition has been dismissed. Big breaking news, ladies and gentlemen, on your screen. This is Delhi High Court upholding the ban the temporary ban on Telegram. Latest update because Telegram was uh used Blocking Telegram is not disproportionate. That's also coming from the Delhi High Court. Delhi High Court This is This is live developments that we are getting on the development that is happening right now on the the center's ban on Telegram ahead of the NEET UG exam. The Delhi High Court on Friday has rejected the petition filed by Telegram challenging the center's decision to block the messaging platform till June 22. So the the the ban will continue to prevent paper leak ahead of the June 2026 [music] re-examination which is scheduled on June 26. Big development. All right. Sarthak is live with us with all the latest details. So, Sarthak, this is a developing story, but it it is it is huge. It is significant.

[00:02:05]The ban has been upheld, and it that government has the right to do so, but the exact verbatim and the kind of observation, the verdict that has been given by the Delhi High Court, if you can put that into perspective.

[00:02:19]>> Well, absolutely, Shivam.

[00:02:21]The Delhi High Court has upheld the ban that was established by by the central government a few days ago on the Telegram app stating that uh Telegram has been is being used sort of like a dark web lately where a lot of shady practices are being carried out on the platform.

[00:02:40]The main argument of Telegram was that this is a specific target on one platform only, and uh uh there is no emergency situation due to which the entire platform has to be banned. They could have uh restricted some channels.

[00:02:53]They could have restricted uh some bots, uh some specific kind of content, and there was no need for them to ban the entire platform. However, uh uh Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who was representing the central government in this particular case, yesterday during the argument, uh put forth a very important point that this is not a permanent ban. It is uh an event-specific ban. It is a temporary ban till the time uh the NEET uh UGC examinations are re-conducted. Uh the ban has to stay there uh just so that any other shady practices can be prevented. And uh the government and the court has also mentioned that the government's order is uh well-founded, and a platform can be banned under Section 69A of the IT Act.

[00:03:38]This is a specific uh uh statement that has come from the uh Delhi High Court uh by Justice Tejas uh uh uh Kariya, uh who has said that government has the power to do so. And just to remind the viewers, this is a similar kind of ban uh to what Abhijit Bhikay's Kokroach Janata Party had witnessed where his Twitter handle was also banned. The Kokroach Janata Party Twitter handle was also banned under Section 69A and where the Delhi High Court said that if they if he has any grievance against such a ban, he can there is a provision under Section 69A that he can uh uh he can rely upon. He can separate committee will be set up. That committee will decide whether the ban was whether the ban was justified or not. At this point, Telegram can sort of avail that that sort of opportunity with them.

[00:04:35]The government the Delhi High Court has held the ban upheld the ban by the government as justified as as uh uh government has the power under Section 69 of the IT Act to make such pass such orders. And at this point, the court has also observed that this is a temporary ban. This is not a permanent ban. It will stay till at least June 30. And restrictions that have been imposed upon Telegram app, the platform, which is infamous for carrying out shady practices, is is correct. And and the ban with this certainly means that the ban that has been established by the government will stay.

[00:05:18]>> But yeah yeah yeah yeah this also sets a precedent now in further judgments also because you understand law pretty well.

[00:05:25]Because in certain cases is because you also highlighted the CJP issue. And in this issue also and the argument that was given by both the sides on one side you had Telegram CEO that he gave the argument that you are punishing more than 150 million people in this entire course. But the it was the consultation was done with the NTA. The ban was uh, to stop the paper leak that happens. The argument by the Telegram CEO is that we have many measures. We are also using AI, this, that, whatever. But the argument that came from the government side, center side, that they have bots and bots can mirror other things and this it's very complicated to to not put the ban on Telegram and it was the need of the hour. If you can explain that to our viewers because the Delhi High Court came to the conclusion to give the verdict because it understood that even if you don't put a ban on Telegram, then the paper leak would have taken place and it was used earlier also for sharing the papers.

[00:06:27]>> Absolutely, Shivam.

[00:06:28]One thing has to be pointed out that Telegram was against the idea of banning one particular platform because they their argument was that it's a specific target on one particular platform.

[00:06:40]Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, on the other hand, argued that the government had first tried sort of alleged restrictive measures before ordering a complete ban on the platform. However, Telegram's architecture is is is fundamentally different from all the other platforms that makes this sort of enforcement of restrictive measures very very difficult.

[00:07:03]The government had to rely upon inputs from from organizations like NTA, which is supposed to which is responsible for conducting NEET examinations and other organizations like MeitY and I4C.

[00:07:17]The center argued that the blocking that blocking any individual channel or any particular content is very difficult and ineffective because users sort of quickly migrate to new channels. They easily create new channels on this platform. Telegram has sort of become a preferred platform for such kind of activities. For example, the paper leak that happened with the NEET examination.

[00:07:41]This is not the first time it happened, it has happened before as well.

[00:07:44]And also he stressed upon the fact that it is important to protect the to protect the credibility of a national examination where millions of students appear like like the NEET examination.

[00:07:55]So it's important that the ban stays the privacy system of the Telegram cannot be uh uh cannot be sort of uh uh go or go against and we we we cannot really target any specific channel in that respect. So it's important that a complete ban is established on the on the app till the time NEET NEET examinations are re-conducted.

[00:08:19]>> Okay, thanks a lot for all the latest developments in the story. Keep tracking all the developments, we'll come back to you as more detail