Silencing Of A President

The power wielded by social media platforms is now legendary.  But silencing the most powerful man on earth? That is something else! Press reports on the unprecedented actions of suspending US President Trump's accounts by social media giants on Thursday may have come as a shock to the world. Especially as this was the president's favourite method of connecting with his people (and the global public at large). This historic moment makes it moot for the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) to reconsider its proposed construct of intermediary liability.

To set the context in India: it was in 2015, in the Shreya Singhal judgment, that the Supreme Court opined that online content could be taken down from intermediary platforms following a court order or at the behest of the government. This afforded social media platforms protection from liability related to user-generated content. Thereafter, MeitY proposed amendments to the Information Technology