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Indian Government Lifts Ban on Blogs

Posted by Zonk on Thu Jul 20, 2006 01:19 PM
from the i-have-a-soapbox-and-i-must-speak dept.
Censorship The Internet
iDope writes "The Department of Telecommunications of the Government of India has lifted the ban on blogs (reported previously on Slashdot) following pressure from the Indian blogger community and the media. Even with the lifting of the ban several bloggers from BloggersCollective are getting ready to file a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) (similar to a Class Action Lawsuit in US) in the Supreme Court of India against the Government censorship of the Internet."
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[+] India Joins China in Censoring Websites 303 comments
cpatil writes "On the directions of the government of India, Indian ISPs have started censoring and blocking web properties. This was first noticed by Indian bloggers and upon inquiring with their respective ISPs, the actions are confirmed. Unfortunately, Blogspot and TypePad are the targets till now." There's an ongoing discussion of the censorship on GoogleGroups. The rediff.com coverage linked above indicates that the blocking is based on a list issued by India's Department of Telecommunications.
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  • We are rejoicing! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tackhead (54550) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:23PM (#15751481)
    "In bureaucratic India, overlords who are first at posting are pleased to be welcoming you!"
    - Steve.

    (Yes I am really being named Steve, and the weather here in Bango...r, Maine is wonderful! We in America are overjoyed to be reading this and posting about it on your Slashdot!)

    • lifted the ban on blogs (reported previously on Slashdot) following pressure from the Indian blogger community

      If the blogs were illegal, why is the Govt. caving in to such criminal 'blogger' community. This is pandering to the criminals. What next, Pakistan O.K.ing manufacture of C4 by terrorists?

      India is on a slippery slope here; today they allow bloggers, tomorrow they got homosexuals burning Indian flags at their weddings to celebrate partial birth evolution.

  • Good news, I guess (Score:3, Informative)

    by ChaosCube (862389) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:25PM (#15751494) Homepage
    Even though I don't live in India, this is good. I'm all for people saying whatever the hell they want, regardless of any governmental restrictions or intrusions. Now, if only we could get the government off our backs here in the states...

  • Great ... now ... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Guanine (883175) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:25PM (#15751500) Homepage
    How about China, with one fifth of the world's population, learns from this and stops censoring their internet, allowing Chinese citizens to fully participate in the online world community?

    • I doubt it (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Silent sound (960334) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:39PM (#15751600)
      What we are seeing here is the difference between a democratic government like India (which has things like elected officals eventually accountable to their constituents and thus amenable to influence by public pressure; and an independent judiciary with the power to check the elected officials if they violate the citizenry's fundamental rights), and a state like China.

      Democracies can be imperfect; democracies like India can make mistakes, or do things (like this Blog censorship program) which are wrong. But at least in a democracy, there is some kind of mechanism in place that can be used to eventually fix the mistakes and correct the wrongs. China has no mechanisms in place to correct the wrongs of those in power. And so you can wait, but the wrongs are not going to just go away.
      • Yeah but in order for democracies to function properly you've got to have a population that pays attention to what's going on and who holds their elected officials accountable when then screw up. Then you get a situation like America where the upper 1% pretty much do whatever the fuck they want because the majority of the citizens don't seem to give a rats ass. Bread and circuses and all that.
      • Democracies can be imperfect [...]

              Gasp! You need to go talk to Papa-Bear O'Reilly *right now*!
      • It has been interesting (to say the least), observing the current Indian Government. A ragtag coalition of opposing political groups, their common underlying theme is "Socialism". Their major coalition partner is the Communist Party of India (Marxist) which has influenced important policy decisions by the govt.

        The Government back-pedalled on the Blogging ban because they were afraid of getting their heads slapped around by the Supreme Court. This Government is the first in recent times (past 20 years) that

  • keep up the coverage :) (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Burlap (615181) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:34PM (#15751551)
    I really hope /. keeps up on the coverage of this story if it goes to court. It would be quite entertaining to see a govt get it's hat handed to them for strongarming their population.

  • Finally! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Andrewkov (140579) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:35PM (#15751567)
    Good news! Now we can outsource Blogging to India!

  • Official Circular (Score:5, Informative)

    by iDope (916846) * on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:39PM (#15751596)
    Here's the official notice by the Department of Telecom to ISPs to remove the block (http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=18954 [pib.nic.in]):
    July 20, 2006 The Department of Telecom (DoT) has instructed all the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in the country to block only the specified website/webpages on the parent website. The DoT, in its letter issued to all the ISPs has mentioned that it had come to notice that in some cases the parent website had been blocked in contravention to what was stated in its earlier order dated 13th July 2006 whereby it ordered the ISPs to block certain websites/webpages. As such the DoT has now directed all the ISPs to strictly comply with the order dated 13th July 2006 and provide unhindered access to Internet except for the websites/webpages which have been specifically mentioned in its orders issued from time to time. The DoT has further sought explanation from the erring ISPs as to why action be not taken against them for blocking unintended websites/webpages.
  • If those poor Indian citizens couldn't get their daily supply of Livejournal emo teenagers, I don't know *what* they would have done. Peaceful protests or some-such - oh, wait, they did.
  • They walk the good talk about public safety, terrorism, etc., but it's always just a ruse to get their foot in the door of censorship. Blocking a blog won't stop the terrorists behind it. Racist speech is only dangerous when it gets the mystique that comes only from being banned by hand-wringing bureaucrats who are open about fearing it.

    Repeat after me, censorship is always bad except in the most extreme cases like publishing a how-to FAQ on building a portable nuclear bomb or up-to-date troop movements. Wh
    • Did you even RTFA? The Govt. asked ISPs to block 17 blogs (not entire blog networks) and even those blogs were not "terrorist" blogs but rather sites inciting reprisals against India's muslim minority for the Bombay bomb blasts last week.

      As for "censorship is always bad except ....", except when you think its justified? Paging Dr. Hypocrite.

  • Playing The Freedom Angle (Score:4, Interesting)

    by blueZhift (652272) on Thursday July 20 2006, @01:57PM (#15751743) Homepage Journal
    This is certainly good news for the Indians, but I wonder if this will be good for business too. Right now I would guess that China and India are pretty fierce competitors for offshored business from the West. China holds the edge right now in manufacturing, while IT related work seems to be India's forte (I reserve the right to be completely wrong about this). I don't really see manufacturing moving to India any time soon, but I think there is some pressure for more IT to go to China where the workers are increasingly cheaper than those in India as Indian wages increase due to high demand.

    But I would guess that the less than free and open society in China coupled with China being looked upon, by the U.S. at least, as a dangerous competitor on the world stage, is putting a brake on IT work freely flowing into China. Seriously, China and the U.S. could be at war tomorrow if Taiwan declared independence. India can play this to their advantage by doing as much as possible to resemble the free and open society that Americans claim to love so much. India is, afterall, the world's largest democracy, so playing the freedom angle isn't too much of a stretch with the right marketing.

    I'm not saying that there is any concious orchestration going on. But stories like censoring the internet don't help the image the government probably wants to project, so reversing that can only be to their advantage.
    • Has the thought occured to you, that India is a democratic country, because, the Indians want it that way, regardless of what China or USA govt. think.

      India gained its freedom from the british in 1947, when neither USA or China, were the world powers that they are today, and it has been a democratic nation since then.

      • India gained its freedom from the british in 1947, when neither USA or China, were the world powers that they are today

        You mean the same 1947 in which the USA was the ONLY nation in the world with a nuclear weapon, and the only major nation not to have lost a significant part of its population and industrial power to war? (Pearl Harbor didn't exactly contribute much in the way of industrial production) I'll give you China, but the US has been a bona fide world power since shortly after we joined WWII.

    • Might make sense if, say, Hollywood (or any content-producing industry) is outsourcing stuff to India. That is not what's happening; as my colleague from Burma will tell you, IT outsourcing doesn't quite "need" a free and open society, a closed totalitarian community of trained droids will do just fine.

      In short, India's tryst with freedom (to echo Nehru's words) isn't to grab that one extra consulting project; it is, let's face it, the only way so many ethnicities can share a common space and prosper.

  • The indian government took a wrong step there, it's good they reversed the decision.

    We're all having to learn how the internet works. Governments, great lumbering beasts that they are, are prone to dumb decisions when it comes to new technology, at least at first.

    I wonder what unseen pressure group was responsible for that. Google's blogspot was blocked. Hmm, I do wonder what microsoft were whispering in the ear of indian politicians before the decision.
  • can snakes even manufacture boots? I mean, the whole insult is just kind of silly. Snakes can BECOME boots, but there is no way they can hand-make boots.

  • Did anyone RTFA ? (Score:5, Informative)

    by genmax (990012) on Thursday July 20 2006, @02:08PM (#15751817)
    So, the article says that ..

    a) The govt. had infact NOT asked for all blogs to be banned. It was just ISPs being clueluess. Repeat after me .. the blanket ban on blogspot and typepad was in ERROR ... the ISPs' mistake .. not the big bad govt's.

    b) The govt. had infact asked for 20 odd blogs and sites to be blocked - these were allegedly trying to incite hatred against certain minority communities, by blaming them for the recent bomb blasts in Mumbai. It was felt that such hate campaigns may lead to a violent reprisal against these communities.

    c) While banning said sites may also be an attack of freedom of speech (though I think this is similar to the ban on Nazi propoganda in Germany). it is NOT in the same league as that in China and North Korea.

    d) This (and by this, I mean blocking the original 20 sites, not the whole of blogspot, etc) is ALSO different from the US govt's reaction after 9/11. There was no attempt to use temporary public anger to justify aggression, infact quite the opposite - the govt. has tried to defuse such tensions and ensure sanity prevails.

  • Democracy != freedom, but it sure makes it easier. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Vellmont (569020) on Thursday July 20 2006, @02:11PM (#15751848)
    In a previously highly rated post [slashdot.org] a reader claimed that democracy doesn't guarantee freedom. From a strict standpoint, he's absolutely right. But democracy makes freedom MUCH easier to attain since in general people want freedom and not opression. I think this reversal of the policy nicely illustrates that. As several others have pointed out, contrast this with a country like China where there's no democracy, and the government keeps a tight grip on its citizens. It's like the addage that money doesn't buy happiness, but the corollary is that it makes it whole lot easier.

  • Legitimate Ban (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 20 2006, @02:22PM (#15751907)
    Either people aren't reading the article or are completely oblivious to recent events.

    Trains in Mumbai (Bombay) were recently bombed in what many people suspect was an act of Islamist terrorism to further the separation/Islamistization of Kashmir.

    The blogs in question were inciting violence against India's muslim population in response to the train attacks. The blocking of these blogs were done to prevent the incitement of retalliatory attacks and to prevent the issue from escalating into an unmanageble situation like what is currently happening in Israel/Lebanon. I for one think this is the only legitimate use of censorship and applaud the Indian government for its foresight and action.

    Many people fail to realize that India is not only the world's largest democracy and for the most part has a responsible government. Unfortunately, India too often gets lumped in with the Islamist extremests to the west (of India) or the Communist despots to the east (of India).
    • Are you Indian? If so, I guess you are trying to be patriotic by defending your government. I you are really patriotic, don't trust your government blindly.

      The blogs in question were inciting violence against India's muslim population in response to the train attacks.

      Do you know that for a fact? Why didn't government inform about thiTill now the government has not even given an explanation on why each of the sites were banned. Couldn't have said it better than this guy (read carefully why this is

    • Unfortunately, India too often gets lumped in with the Islamist extremests to the west (of India) or the Communist despots to the east (of India).

      Who are the dorks who modded such utterances insightful???

      North western border of India has Pakistan which is not "Islamist extremests" (is Germany only "neo-nazis"?).

      West Bengal [wikipedia.org] which is to the east of India and the southern state of Kerala has communist parties in power. Both the states are topping in literacy, education, and other welfare related indic
      • You sir, as a loyal Anonymous Coward are likely going to remain suspicious of every government's activity. Oh yeah, forgot. You are also going to:

        1) Hate Microsoft.
        2) Love Linux.
        3) Be a Java or C++ code monkey.
        4) Live in your parent's basement/grandmother's garage.
        5) Not have a steady girlfriend.

  • (all) blogs were never banned (Score:5, Interesting)

    by nileshbansal (665019) on Thursday July 20 2006, @02:40PM (#15752033) Homepage

    Govt of India never banned all blogs. After terrorist attack in Mumbai, 22 sites were ordered to be blocked to prevent communal hatred and riots. The order was misinterpreted [hindustantimes.com] by ISPs who blocked blogspot.com (this was just a mistake).

    I am against all kind of govt censoring (including this). But this ban should not be compared to one in China. The two are fundamentally different as India is a democracy and Indian Constitution provides freedom of expression. But this ban was not unconstitutional as freedom of expression does not allow one to spread opinions of hatred.

  • Great. Now how about the ban on exporting dahl?

    • Re:Okay (Score:3, Informative)

      by rovingeyes (575063)
      Ever hear of wikipedia? Anyways, try this link [wikipedia.org]
    • But like any judiciary, the case has to brought before it.

      You have to bear in mind that this govt is a Left-wing coalition, and so their willingness to resort to things like censorship will be greater.

      The center-right political opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party, have in the past championed laws such as the Prasar Bharati Act to protect independence of the media from arbitrary government censorship, precisely because the Indian Left have a long history of playing these types of games.

      That's why th

    • Re:Now that the ban on blogs has been lifted ... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by rovingeyes (575063) on Thursday July 20 2006, @02:17PM (#15751880)
      can we get electricity/water/food for all the poor people out there who don't even know what a blog is?

      Wow, I have never seen a more rhetorical question from a guy who comes from India and is apparently settled in US (visit his website [tripod.com]). Somehow I feel that you are one of those millions of Indians in US who feels they care about their country and express it in soulless words. If you were all that concerned, you wouldn't be waving racing flags at Nascar races, but instead be in India and help the poor in that country get education or something goddamit.

          • that's the nth time my big mouth has got me into trouble ... now i'm just going to make wise ass remarks about trivial topics. but since we're in this subject ... what is the total percentage of people in India who actually read blogs? About 2% of the population have access to the Internet in India. I totally agree that "freedom of press" is important, but we don't see that even in the traditional print medium. I'd say this story [indiatimes.com] is more worthy of /.
    • This shows India is real democracy. Goverment just cannot do anything it likes. What happened may be far from perfect Democracy but still show the difference between India & Chin

      Yeah, or the difference between India and America...

    • In a pure democracy, the government can do whatever it wants, the government being the majority.

      "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote."

    • You have the right to speak freely using your body, your tools and your property. No law and no politician can change that.

      Actually, yes it can. A human being does not have any god-given de-facto right to own property any more than a llama does. It is the law that gives you right to own property, and the law could just as easily take it away.

      The only "right" you are born with, the only "right" granted to you by nature, is the right to live, think, and die as you please. Any other "rights" you have are gra

      • I have always wondered why people think that God or 'Nature" will come and give them rights. An animal has the right to live until some stronger animal kills it and eats it. In a place like Somalia you have the right to whatever you are strong enough to capture and keep away from everyone else. Modern liberal western society is a "virtual" world where we all decided that everyone has certian rights and then formed various oragnizations to preserve them. Prior to 1865, of what use was the Bill of Rights to a
    • I also noticed that most Indian entrepreneurs ignore the business regulations, tax requirements and licensing regulations
      But I'm sure they rapidly remember regulations about property ownership when their hungry neighbors try to grab what they have. Indian businessmen ignore regulations that are not in their favor when it's convenient, not because they are making some anarcho-capitalist point. Just how dumb are you?
      • Think about it, Michael Moore might have had an atomic bomb dropped on his lard ass by now otherwise!

        Just out of curiosity, do you really believe that his BMI is more significant than his politics?

      • I seriously doubt a handful of bloggers, by themselves, mass the raw democratic clout to decide even a close vote. But then, that's not the point. Democratic politics aren't really about elections - elections are just the safety valve. The reality of politics is that the people the ultimate power not just every so often, but continually. (This is true even in a tyrannny. When a misruled people realise their strength, you get a "color revolution".) If the public en masse decide that politicians must, or must
      • The point libertarians make is that property and self ownership constitute the least possible coercion of any system. Economic and interpersonal activitiy would be limited by consent, but never by imposition.

        Add more freedom, you allow imposition. Take more freedom, and that is an imposition. Libertarian anarchy sits precisely where the curve crosses the zero.
    • Ah, yes. A post about censorship in India under an article about censorship in India. Clearly offtopic.

      I don't usually complain about moderation, especially that of my own posts, but WTF?
      If you feel you must protect your county no matter what it does, why not reply and explain to me how culturally insensitive I am in thinking that censorship sucks.

      If, however, the moderator was on crack or just wasted, please accept my apology and enjoy your experience.

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