Twitter, Facebook, other social media platforms will have to follow Indian laws: Minister

The new amendments to IT rules impose a legal obligation on social media companies to take all out efforts to prevent barred content and misinformation, the government said on Saturday making it clear that platforms such as Twitter and Facebook operating in India will have to abide by local laws and constitutional rights of Indian users. The new rules provide for setting up appellate committees which can overrule decisions of the big tech firms on takedown or blocking requests.

The hardening of stance against the big tech companies comes at a time when discontent has been brewing over alleged arbitrary acts of social media platforms on flagged content, or not responding fast enough to grievances.