HC questions Telegram ban ahead of NEET re-test

New Dehi: The Delhi High Court on Thursday questioned the government's rationale behind temporarily restricting messaging platform Telegram for nearly 150 million users in India ahead of the NEET re-examination scheduled for June 21.

While reserving its judgment on the Telegram FZ-LLC's petition against the temporary ban on the messaging application till June 22, Justice Tejas Karia during the hearing questioned the Centre on how it could deprive the rights of 150 million Telegram users just because one set of citizens is appearing in the examination.

"The question is, can you block somebody else's rights to protect someone else's rights?" the judge asked, while seeking responses from both the government and Telegram on how concerns surrounding paper leaks and misinformation could be addressed without resorting to blanket restrictions.


Solicitor General Tushar Mehta justified the temporary ban on Telegram, saying the platform's architecture was insufficient, which is why emergency powers were used to temporarily ban the application.

Telegram's bot architecture and cloud-based system make it particularly vulnerable to misuse and difficult for law enforcement agencies to trace offenders, he said, adding that the platform's architecture makes it unable to do what is required in these circumstances. A Telegram account can create 40 bots, while WhatsApp allows only one bot per user, he said.

"The scale at which it can multiply is only available on Telegram. Also, suppose if they remove one bot, other bots can be created under different names and identifiers and therefore, measures against bots only have a temporary relief."

He said that the platform operates through the cloud infrastructure. "Those who commit crime cannot be tracked".

"We do not have this problem with other intermediaries like Facebook or WhatsApp. This platform operates through the cloud, even if we block something and someone does mischief, the law enforcement agency can't reach the person," he said, adding that Telegram's platform is not competent enough to deal with the current situation, unlike other similar messaging apps.

Telegram has multiplicity encouraging architecture, and bots can further multiply. If Telegram removes one bot, other bots can be created under different names and identifiers, therefore, measures against bots only have a temporary relief as Telegram's extensive bot ecosystem provides automatic redirection to mirror channels for deleted channels, the SG said.