[Priyam Mitra is a third-year student at the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), Bengaluru. In this piece, the author interrogates the constitutional validity of the Sahyog Platform and the 2025 Rules, arguing that the recent judicial endorsement in X Corp v. UOI fails to account for the bypass of Section 69A safeguards. By analysing the shift toward “reasoned intimations” that exclude the content originator, the author highlights a systemic erosion of legal remedies and the Right to be heard. The analysis concludes that the current “digital post office” model risks transforming into a mechanism for unaccountable state-led takedowns, urging a reconsideration of intermediary governance through the lens of procedural fairness and global best practices.]
The Government introduced the Sahyog rules in 2025 with the purpose of streamlining government takedown orders. The creation of the platform and its rules was challenged in the case of X Corp. v UOI, where Justice Nagaprasanna of Karnataka High Court upheld the new amendment. The court described the platform as a “digital post office” ensuring efficiency and traceability). Ostensibly, the platform does not create a new mechanism of takedown and is meant to ensure that the scattered process of notices and follow-ups are streamlined by relying on s79 of the IT act and Rule 3(1)(d) of the 2021 Intermediary rules. However, the “reasoned intimation” in the amendment departs from the 2009 Blocking rules as takedown orders through the Sahyog platform do not require any notification to the user/originator and only requires the reasons to be given to the intermediary.
Even then, there is no mechanism of hearing the intermediary or the user under the mechanism before such notification is issued. The time period to takedown the material has been recently reduced to 3 hours from the previous period of 36 hours. The amendment also expands the scope of authorities who can issue such orders to both officers not below the rank of joint secretary and police administration not below the rank of deputy inspector general of police. The Internet Freedom Foundation commented on the Sahyog amendment noting how the amendment makes it so a copy of reasons is not needed to be given to the originator of the content, thus they may not be able to challenge it in court also, restricting their right to legal remedies. The court, however, declared the amendment to be constitutional and perhaps this quote by the court serves as the backdrop for the reasoning: “Social media, as the modern amphitheater of ideas, cannot be left in a state of anarchic freedom (24.3(9)).”
This blog piece argues that the case of X Corp is per incuriam and for better intermediary governance, there are several opportunities presented in the 2021 guidelines and learnings from foreign jurisdictions which should be discussed more broadly; and it is only hoped that this blog is an honest attempt at the same. Starting this discussion, it would be only fitting if the case of X corp is discussed first.
- X Corp v UOI
The judgment spans 351 pages and there are several interesting aspects to discuss here. However, to start off, an immediate pushback to the judgment emerge. This relates to the Court not entertaining the plea of an Article 19 violation by the creation of these rules. The Court ruled that since X Corp. as a corporation based in foreign soil cannot avail of the fundamental right of freedom of speech, the challenge to the amendment basis Article 19 is futile. However, the Court fails to entertain the thought that while intermediaries are not right holders here, the takedown orders probably affect the citizens who write on these platforms disproportionately and they indeed have their right to freedom of speech and expression. The court does not answer these submissions and does not see if the amendment passes the muster of Article 19(2) (See here).
Apart from the constitutional challenge, I will now try to delve into the incorrect analysis of the court with respect to interpretation of the IT Act and the corresponding rules. The paper now moves on to its more direct and legal criticism of the judgment.
Incorrect segregation of section 69A and 79.
A key way by which the Sahyog platform whittles down the Shreya Singhal Standard is by constructing a parallel mechanism of giving notice and taking down content. This is done through reliance on section 79(3)(b) and not section 69A. The petitioner argued in this case that the phrase “on being notified by the appropriate Government” necessarily refers to a valid order issued under Section 69A and consequentially s.79(3)(b) cannot operate as an independent mechanism without following the safeguards of section 69A. Scholars like Vasudev Devadasan have already made this distinction of s.69A and s.79 by relying on Shreya Singhal. The Court in Shreya Singhal noted that “it must first be appreciated that Section 79 is an exemption provision […] being an exemption provision, it is closely related to provisions which provide for offences including Section 69A. (¶121)”. Like section 52 of the copyright Act, section 79 is the exemption provision while section 69A is the enabling one.
Now, how did the Karnataka High Court sidestep this submission? Unfortunately, the reasoning given is flawed at best and deliberately malignant at worst. The Court upholds blocking under Section 79(3)(b) by first holding that Shreya Singhal does not apply to this case. This the court does by looking at the regulatory schema at the time the judgment was delivered and comparing it with the regulatory landscape in 2025. The court in Shreya Singhal deliberated upon the IT Act, the 2009 Blocking rules, and the 2011 IT rules. The court here notes that the 2011 rules have been superseded by the 2021 Intermediary guidelines, and the court argues that since the rules have undergone a “complete change”, the case has been confined to history. This is a blatant error of the Court as while the court in Shreya Singhal did adjudicate upon the 2011 rules which have been superseded now, its findings on the interface between s.69A and s.79 are still good law and have to be followed by all subordinate courts. As already seen, the Supreme Court had clearly demarcated the functions of the two sections in different spheres of exception and enforcement. By not following this ratio, I submit that the judgment in X Corp is per incuriam.
- A Hobson’s choice:
Having analysed the judgement in some detail, this section traces the possible repercussions of the judgment and at least the near future of intermediary governance. The Supreme Court in Shreya Singhal upheld the government notice-and-takedown scheme only on the precondition of it abiding by the 2009 rules. However, the safeguards enshrined in the 2009 rules have been effectively bypassed by mounting a parallel mechanism of government notices not under S.69A but the Sahyog Platform. This means that without the safeguards, there is a very real possibility of government officials or police giving such notices without reason. The intermediaries are then faced with what is a classic example of a Hobson’s choice. This means that the platforms are doomed if they don’t abide by the notice within the given time frame thereby losing their safe harbour, and if they abide by the notice, they risk freezing free speech of the users on its platforms. However, the alternative of losing the safe harbour outweighs the platform’s responsibility of encouraging free speech. Justice Patel in Kunal Kamra puts this much more eloquently:
“An intermediary will do anything to retain safe harbour. It will bend the knee to a Government directive regarding content. Its business depends on safe harbour and immunity from prosecution for hosted content. Between safe harbour and user’s rights regarding content, the intermediary faces a Hobson’s choice; and no intermediary is quixotic enough to take up cudgels for free speech. Compromising one particular chunk of content is a small price to pay; better the user content is thrown under the bus than having the bus run over the entire business (¶81)”
- The Way Forward
As mentioned in the introduction, the timeline for taking down the content has been reduced to 3 hours and it can be reasonably stated that the intermediaries would be further coerced in taking down content without verifying the veracity of the request. While the Sahyog amendment’s aims are laudatory in as much as they seek to expeditiously takedown material that are non-consensual or exploitative or a threat to national security, it must also be remembered that the solution must not be so that is disproportionate to the problem it seeks to resolve.
Indeed, the court in X Corp did examine in detail the growing threats to cybersecurity in the modern era. However, the present regulatory regime does not fail because of the time taken for due process (hearing). In fact, X Corp.’s appeal states that before the Sahyog Amendment, they had complied with 91% of 29,118 takedown requests. This shows that while a few cracks to enforcement do remain, a large majority of the requests are handled by such intermediaries. This is also a testament to the effectiveness of the penalty given under 69A- imprisonment up to 7 years. As far as the issue of expeditiously removing content in sensitive situations is concerned, the 2009 guidelines outline an emergency provision where the requirement of hearing is changed to a post-facto hearing (Rule 9). The Sahyog Platform effectively turns the emergency procedure of the 2009 rules into the norm.
The Platform’s validity is again in question, as Kunal Kamra recently approached the Bombay High Court challenging the amendment on grounds of the rules bypassing the safeguards of 69A. Perhaps this is an opportunity for the High Court to deliberate on the matter keeping in mind the correct interpretation of Shreya Singhal. Again, at the risk of repetition, safe harbour protection should not be treated as a dangling carrot for which intermediaries are made to jump through loops and bounds. As Devadasan identifies in his paper, the pro-active measures listed in the 2021 guidelines are inherently “ex-post, ad-hoc, and typically only apply to one intermediary and one piece of content.”
- Lessons from Foreign Jurisdictions
To effectively ensure that the 2021 pro-active measures are followed while not threatening the safe harbour of intermediaries, the Digital Services Act in the EU is a useful example. Article 6 of the DSA is a corollary to Section 79 of the IT Act and provides safe harbour subject to the removal of unlawful content upon receiving “actual knowledge”. Chapter III of the DSA is a corollary to the Indian 2021 regulations which talk about transparency, intermediaries appointing points of contact, providing opportunity of hearing to consumers whose posts have been removed among others. However, as Devadasan also notes, pursuant to Recital 41 of the DSA, these obligations are not treated as “pre-conditions to safe harbour”. Rather, non-observance of these obligations subjects the intermediaries to huge monetary fines.
Notably, India currently lacks a supervisory body to oversee whether such obligations are being followed or not and till such a body is created, the burden lies on the ill-equipped judiciary when a plaint is so filed in the court. The DSA has Digital Services Coordinators in each jurisdiction as supervisory bodies. Having such an independent body in India would serve dual purposes. The first being that these obligations do not remain mere writings on a legislation and are enforced by the intermediaries. The second consequential purpose is that the intermediaries observing these obligations would lead to swift moderation of content and the need for extreme measures such as the Sahyog Platform would be deterred.