New Delhi: In addition to a nationwide crackdown on and detention of protesters planning to join the October 10 march at Jantar Mantar, including the closure of Metro stations and key trains, and visits and calls to people, the MeitY has issued an advisory to social media platforms to exercise “enhanced diligence” over potentially misleading content related to public events, Medianama reported.This advisory is issued as a movement rages across the country against the Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and Election Commission’s handling of the special intensive revisions. Already, in previous iterations of the protests in Delhi, internet has been shut down in key places.The Internet Freedom Foundation has noted in a statement that the unpublished advisory raises concerns about legality, free speech and government censorship.The watchdog notes that the advisory cites no legal authority, introduces undefined obligations beyond existing IT Rules, and encourages proactive monitoring, potentially causing platforms to over-censor protest-related content. Its vague standards and prioritisation of government complaints also undermine transparency and accountability, the IFF notes.The full statement is below.Statement: MeitY’s “enhanced diligence” advisory pressures platforms to police protest speech. It must be withdrawn.October 9, 2026On October 8, MeitY’s Cyber Laws Division sent an advisory to all social media intermediaries. It asks them to exercise “enhanced diligence” over false, misleading, manipulated or out-of-context content linked to “ongoing public events and developments”, to “identify, prevent and not promote” unlawful information, to label or “contextualise” misleading content, and to prioritise complaints from “authorised Government agencies” on public-order content. It takes effect immediately. MeitY has not published it and its text became public through MediaNama. It was issued as citizens protest in Delhi and Mumbai over the revision of electoral rolls, with a protest called at Jantar Mantar for October 10. We call on MEITY to withdraw it.First, the advisory names no provision that empowers MeitY to issue it and such advisories are not issued under any law. Section 79(2)(c) of the IT Act conditions safe harbour on “due diligence” and on guidelines the Central Government may “prescribe”, that is, by rules notified and laid before Parliament under Section 87. The IT Rules recognise only “due diligence” under Rule 3 and “additional due diligence” for significant social media intermediaries under Rule 4. The phrase, “Enhanced diligence” used in this Advisory appears in neither. Further, MeitY’s proposed Rule 3(4) in the last round of Amendments mooted to the IT Rules, 2021, which has not been notified further confirms this does not have any legal character. Second, an advisory cannot alter the application of existing law. Rule 3(1)(b)(v) covers only misinformation communicated “knowingly and intentionally” that is “patently false and untrue or misleading in nature”. The advisory drops both qualifiers and adds “social tranquility”, neither that nor “misleading” is a ground for restricting speech under Article 19(2).Third, facing an undefined standard platforms will censor more than the law requires. The advisory asks them to “identify, prevent and not promote” unlawful information and to “strengthen their existing monitoring”. This is proactive monitoring by another name, which the Rules contemplate only for narrow categories such as child sexual abuse material. Further, it is vague and does does not define “authorised Government agencies” or “priority”, and does not require platforms to tell users that a government complaint lay behind an action. Users will see only a platform decision. The State’s role disappears, and with it any route to challenge that role in court. The advisory governs public speech but is not itself public. It cites no statutory provision, is approved by an unnamed “competent authority”, and does not identify the events or content that prompted it.We anticipate a huge spike in censorship over the next few days.We call on MeitY to:1. Publish the advisory in full, including any clause (v), and state the provision under which it was issued.2. Withdraw it, or clarify that it creates no obligations beyond the IT Act and Rules and that “enhanced diligence” is not a condition of safe harbour.3. Disclose which agencies are sending complaints under it, and how many.4. Abandon the proposed Rule 3(4).We also call on platforms to:1. Disclose all government complaints and requests received under this advisory.2. Act only on requests that meet the Shreya Singhal standard and Rule 3(1)(d).3. Refrain from proactively filtering or downranking protest content on the basis of this advisory.4. Notify affected users, including when an action follows a government complaint.Note: In a post-script, the IFF has noted that it got the text of the advisory from the Medianama website.