While the National Testing Agency (NTA) welcomed the Telegram ban, Internet advocacy groups have called it a “band-aid solution” and a “disproportionate answer” to the NEET (UG) exam paper leak issue.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), on the recommendation of NTA, restricted the use of Telegram in India until June 22, the day after the re-examination, and directed the platform to disable message editing for all Indian users until June 30.
According to the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), the “blunt” nationwide move, although aimed at controlling fraud rackets, is constitutionally incompatible and contradictory to NTA’s own statements.
The NTA, in its release dated Tuesday, June 16, claimed the block has “secured the prompt take-down of a substantial number of Telegram channels, groups and bots,” which is largely “the reason the harm caused by these rackets has been contained to the extent it has.”
IFF argued that if the platform-level restrictions contained the harm, then the need for a blanket ban was redundant. “The government has reached for a heavier tool while conceding that a lighter one was working,” the organisation said. It noted that NTA itself acknowledged that the block affected lakhs of citizens who use the platform legitimately for personal, educational, professional, and informational reasons.
The agency also said the security of the examination is “unaffected by the action taken,” action being the ban, to which the Internet Freedom Foundation said, “If the exam is secure and no leak exists, what is being suppressed is rumour.” A rumour cannot justify shutting down a platform when targeted blocking and legal proceedings remain available options, the organisation said.
The organisation added that the “reactive and ineffective” ban would punish ordinary users instead of addressing the systemic source of exam paper leaks. It urged MeitY to release a statement, flagging a lack of transparency in the way the directions were issued.
“An announcement of a block is no substitute for an order the affected party can challenge.
Blunt to enforce and very easy to evade,” IFF said.
Emphasising that the examination is worth protecting, the organisation said it requires securing the entire process, “rather than reaching for purported band-aid solutions that instead cause more harm.”
What are users saying?
An Indian user on X said that fewer problems are solved and more scapegoats are found, referring to the platform ban. “Paper leaks Karne wala azad, platform ban (those who leaked the paper are free, but the platform was banned).”
“See the strategy of NTA and MeitY, couldn’t stop the paper leak so they blocked Telegram itself. In India, problems are solved less and more scapegoats are found.”
The 19-year-old ethical hacker who flagged discrepancies in the on-screen marking (OSM) in CBSE examinations said the ban was more so ineffective because the platform was “built with censorship resistance in mind and has spent years operating in countries with far more aggressive internet controls than India.”
Telegram slams government action, says ban punishes 150 million users
Telegram founder Pavel Durov echoed the Internet advocacy group, saying it punishes “150 million ordinary Telegram users in India, not the insiders who leaked the exam materials.”
The platform denied that it was the source of the leak. “We’ve done a lot to help fix the problem – even though its source is not Telegram. Telegram is a force for good. Banning it, even temporarily, is a mistake.”
The platform has also been replying to posts on X with sarcastic remarks to highlight the ban’s impact. When Congress MP Karti P Chidambaram responded to the block with, “Seriously! Blocking Telegram is the master stroke to prevent examination paper leaks?” the platform said, “You should also shut down all the shopping malls since there might be theft in one of them. And close the roads because I heard someone was speeding.”
Follow on Twitter | Posted by Khadija Irfan Rahim | 
