The World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 2025 highlights India as a top country, for the second year running at risk from misinformation and disinformation. The report highlights the affinities between “Censorship and surveillance, societal polarisation, misinformation and disinformation and online harms”, highlighting the confluence of these risks in the digital ecosystem.
The Government of India has the habit of dismissing such indices as anti-national propaganda and fake news. This ostrich-like behaviour can only reinforce the perception that India is an illiberal democracy veering towards authoritarian rule.
The Government of India has the habit of dismissing indices as anti-national propaganda and fake news.
To some extent misinformation, disinformation, rumours and fake news are passe in India. A WhatsApp-fuelled lynching might make the news. However, the cover-ups and the roadblocks in the way of justice for the victims suggest that India’s deeply politicised judiciary is incapable of delivering justice for all “without fear or favour”.
Attempts to rewrite history
There is a distinction between partial or even false information meant to be a parody, and information that is deliberate, intentional, and foundationally meant to sow discord. Misinformation and disinformation in India belong to the second category. This is witnessed in frequent attempts to rewrite history based on falsities and factual inaccuracies.
In the context of Hindu nationalism, all sorts of “supernatural” claims have become normalised – ancient rituals, Vedic practices and commodified practices. These are legitimised, for example, through the godman-entrepreneur Baba Ramdev and Youtubers such as Ranveer Allahbadia who was recently the subject of a Supreme Court intervention after he expressed “vulgar”, anti-family values on a comedy show.
Selective application of legal standards
The fact that the courts gave him a second chance perhaps because of his “soft Hindutva” credentials, a political ideology encompassing the cultural justification of Hindu nationalism and the belief in establishing Hindu hegemony within India, enabling him to continue with his YouTube obscurantisms, and ignored Baba Ramdev’s false claims related to yoga reflect the selective application of legal standards that exist in India on matters related to misinformation. It is not as if there are no rules and regulations to deal with this explosion of fake news. There are.
These include Section 69A of the Information Technology Rules, the Telecommunications Act 2023, the amended Rule 3(1)(b)(v) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (2023 Amendment), the Prohibition of Fake News on Social Media Bill, and Sections153 and 293, Indian Penal Code along with other clauses, are meant to provide the means to combat misinformation.
It is not as if there are no rules and regulations to deal with this explosion of fake news. There are.
However, it seems that the legal provisions are meant to protect the government from fake news’ rather than the citizens. In fact, the Indian government is investing in an eco-system to combat fake news about itself.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) has attempted to establish a Fact Checking Unit at the Press Information Bureau meant to combat fake news of the government – a project that is to be regularised via amendments made to the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 in April 2022. However, the judiciary put a stop to the move declaring the amendment to the IT Rule “unconstitutional”.
Silencing those dupped “anti-national”
The botched attempt shows that in India the rule of law with respect to fake news is being weaponised and is sought to be applied selectively to silence those who are dubbed “anti-national”. There are, however, occasions when anti-minority fake news is proscribed. This happened, for example, when the ruling party’s spokesperson Nupur Sharma made derogatory “fake” statements on the Prophet Muhammad that led to violence, pressure from friendly countries in the Middle East led to her suspension from the party.
Countries around the world are scrambling to create effective laws against fake news in a world in which AI-based deep fakes and partisan/fake news eco-systems flourish on the internet. This is as true in the US as it is in India. In both cases, however, it would seem that the delegitimization of core ideologies antithetical to the majoritarian worldview – wokism in the USA and secularism in India – has been accompanied by major investments in “alt information”.
Countries around the world are scrambling to create effective laws against fake news in a world in which AI-based deep fakes and partisan/fake news eco-systems flourish on the internet.
This “alt information” in India is reflected in a range of attempts to revise and rewrite history from that of the Hindutva ideologue and politician Vinayak Damodar Savarkar to the contributions of the Mughals (Turko-Mongol rulers who ruled the Mughal Empire in India from 1526 to 1858), to the Youtubers, Instagrammers, WhatsApp and Facebook groups involved in peddling dubious histories, false remedies, and majoritarian solutions.
To remedy this fake news pandemic, there is a need to fix the meaning of terms such as ‘fake’ and ‘misinformation’ in Indian law that currently are vague and invite a range of meanings and interpretations. The law also needs to be clear, applied consistently, and tied to the public interest rather than to the interest of the state. Most importantly, there is a need to de-weaponize fake news.
Originally published under Creative Commons by 360info™.
