I am not an expert on law, but a friend of mine says that the Indian IT act is a bit too much. Regular defamation is treated as a civil case and defamation using information technology is treated as a criminal case. The discrimination starts here.
Bloggers and email users are not united, but the main stream media is a united force and no one dares even to make a statement against them. Pinarayi tried to close its mouth, but he got more than what he wished for and stopped. The media syndicate is working !!
Even after having published thousands of nonsense stuff, Manorama and other media are still thriving. Their sting operations have reached even your ballot paper, still no action against them. Main stream media can do anything and can get away with it.
If bloggers are to be regulated then newspapers, magazines and TV channels also should be regulated. A few months back a blogger was arrested in Trivandrum for having published his opinion about a construction company in Trivandrum. He was forced to apologize and take down his posts. I wonder how the “crime” magazine still manages to publish.
Dont we need a newspaper act here under which reporters and newspaper editors will be send to jail for publishing factual mistakes, even if they are in reported speech. Love Jihad was such a nonsense.
The takeaway for bloggers is simple, never publish wrong information and always be united if someone tries to take away our freedom of opinion.
I am surprised that non of the NGO’s or independent organizations have moved in and started making noise about the media abuse … Looks like it is all up to us to fight the mighty media. Well to be fair … not only India – other first world countries are also not interested in controlling their media … as the political class use it to churn out their own propaganda. Internet is a threat to these same politicians and media – as people themselves are using it to bring the truth out – no wonder they are rushing to put a cap on it…
Comment by JMJ — November 24, 2009 @ 4:09 pm
Firstly it is not correct to say that defamation through blogs is a criminal offence. The closest provision of ITA 2008 that relates to “Defamation” is Section 66A(c) which states “..Any person who sends, by means of a computer resource or a communication device,-any information which he knows to be false, but for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred, or ill will, persistently by making use of such computer resource or a communication device,”
The word “persistently” used here means that this can be applied only in respect of continued bombardment of messages meant to cause annoyance.. This is actually meant to tackle “Cyber Stalking”. Other parts of Sec 66A relate to “threats” and “mails with false address”.. These cover spam.
Defamation is still handled under IPC with electronic evidence.
In 2007, in a series of articles at http://www.naavi.org (Ref: http://www.naavi.org/cl_editorial_07/Bloggers%20Beware.pdf),I had discussed the issue of bloggers getting themselves organized into an online forum just like the news papers who are protected by the Press Council.
Unfortunately, bloggers were and perhaps continue to be incapable of appreciating the risks. We are aware how IIPM and NDTV have in the past moved defamation cases against bloggers.
Hope some time in future the bloggers will understand the seriousness of law and consider some action.
Comment by Naavi — November 25, 2009 @ 5:57 pm
Kenny, there is indeed a difference. You (or me) are not allowed to say “Mr. X is a cheat” or “Ms. Z is a whore” because we are just living mortals within the framework of this thing called law.
Mr. Sudhakaran and Mr. Pinarayi belong to a different class of citizens who hold the power to disperse and scatter this law, just like a Prism to light. They are above the law and they are allowed to call Bishops “wretched creatures” and can also threaten to “show the thing b/w” on record.
I’m not supporting people who propagated this email, these kind of activities need curbing but a lot is left to be desired by the way the Cyber Cell reached those youth. They are aware that the real engineers of this scam are abroad, so they did a hand-eye wash by nabbing two pawns at their reach.
Whoever you are, you are not allowed to personally attack any individual or organization without enough proof of what you’re saying. Even quoting Wikipedia is not legally enough if you’re talking about sensitive issues like this. Yes, blogosphere is too meek in India and if we try to act like the Press then we’re doomed… That’s the situation now. As you told there are clear double standards.
PS: I’ve had my own say about this issue, over in my space and I was wondering if I was loitering on the edges of any cyber crime…:D
Comment by scorpiogenius — November 25, 2009 @ 9:20 pm
I m tempted to comment, but with the new IT Act Amendments, I prefer talking or writing to a newspaper editor, that is a much safer place!
What if you FORWARDED my comments to someone, you, me and the recipients would all end up in jail
What is this world coming to?!
Comment by Arun Mathew — November 25, 2009 @ 11:05 pm
Heading to 2012, what else
Comment by Mahesh — December 1, 2009 @ 3:12 pm
If bloggers won’t unite, who else will do it for them… And regarding, the
press, The Press council is the authority handling complaints.
Comment by Tony Jose — December 1, 2009 @ 3:26 pm
Only because of British we have criminal defamation law. Defamation should be a civil matter especially when we talk about exposing corruption, exposing poor quality of service by construction company and such things.
Indian cyber laws are extreme. It puts too much power in the hands of the police and the police of course misuses it for favouring the more powerful and corrupt parties. The poor blogger will be finally doubly victimised, first time for the bad service he received and second time for criminal defamation.
Comment by bnu — January 21, 2010 @ 9:43 am