The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) is working hard on censoring the controversial documentary "India: The Modi Question" released by the BBC. The two-episode documentary was released on January 17, 2022. It talks about Modi's leadership during the 2002 riots in Gujarat, in which over 1,000 people died. Using its emergency powers, the MIB issued directions to block multiple videos of the documentary uploaded on YouTube by third parties (not by the BBC), said Kanchan Gupta of the MIB. Not only that but these blocking directions were also issued for over 50 tweets with links to YouTube videos about the documentary as well. Both YouTube and Twitter have complied with the directions, Gupta said. Last week we reported that the BBC documentary was taken down from YouTube, not because of government interference but because the documentary was uploaded on YouTube without BBC's permission by random users. However, recent developments make it clear that the government has also asked YouTube and Twitter to censor this documentary. Not a one-time blocking order: “YT has been instructed to block the video if uploaded again. @Twitter has been directed to block tweets linking video on other platforms,” Gupta said. This shows that the ministry has not just asked YouTube and Twitter to block certain tweets but to block a particular media content (documentary video/link) from ever being shared on their platforms. This ‘long-lasting’ form of censorship is worth noting from a free speech perspective. Centre’s arguments for removing the documentary: Multiple ministries found that the documentary was “casting aspersions on the authority and credibility of Supreme Court of…
