SC: Surveillance state is govt plan?

Satya Prakash

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 13

Frowning upon its move to monitor social media platforms, the Supreme Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre on TMC legislator Mohua Moitra’s petition challenging it.

A three-judge Bench,  headed by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, asked the Centre to file its response in two weeks after senior advocate AM Singhvi, representing Moitra, alleged that monitoring of social media was akin to personal surveillance of citizens by the state.

The Bench, which also included Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud, sought the assistance of Attorney General.

“If the government is seeking to monitor every single tweet and WhatsApp message that is sent, we’ll be moving towards becoming a surveillance state,” Justice Chandrachud commented.

Since the impugned tender inviting bids for supply of software for the project closes on August 30, the Bench posted the matter for hearing on August 3.

The TMC MLA had on June 18 moved the top court challenging the Centre’s move to set up a ‘Social Media Communication Hub’ to collect and analyse digital and social media content. Moitra wanted the top court to stay the entire project on the ground that it would violate an individual’s right to privacy.

A Vacation Bench had, however, refused to grant urgent hearing and asked her counsel to either move a high court for urgent hearing or wait till the vacation got over. The government was trying to monitor social media content of individuals by tracking their Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts as also their emails, petitioner’s counsel Md Nizam Pasha had submitted. “This will be a breach of privacy of an individual. Under the project, people, right up to the district level will be monitored,” Pasha had said.

The Broadcast Engineering Consultants India Limited (BECIL) — a Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) — recently floated a tender inviting bids for supply of software for the project. Under the project, mediapersons would be employed on a contractual basis in each district to be the “eyes and ears” of the government and provide real-time updates from the ground. They would take people’s feedback on government’s policies and follow the news trending in their areas.

“A technology platform is needed to collect digital media chatter from all core social media platforms as well as digital platforms such as news, blogs... In a single system providing real-time insights, metrics and other valuable data,” the tender document says. The platform is expected to provide automated reports, tactical insights and comprehensive workflows to initiate engagement across digital channels.