Update

On 6 August 2026, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) issued a press release restating takedown timelines that had already been in force since 20 February 2026, under the IT Rules amendment notified that month. Under the amendment, platforms must remove content found unlawful by a valid court or government order within three hours, down from the previous 36-hour window. For content involving impersonation or intimate imagery, the window is two hours, down from 24. Timelines for resolving user grievances were separately shortened, from 72 hours to 36.

The press release did not introduce new rules. It restated an amendment that had already been operative for nearly six months. MeitY did not explain in the release why it chose to reiterate the timelines at this point, though the announcement follows continued government emphasis on rapid content moderation enforcement through 2026.

The reiteration comes as the underlying legal framework is itself under challenge. On 22 July 2026, the Supreme Court stayed four separate High Court proceedings challenging the constitutional validity of the government's Sahyog portal and its use of Section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act to direct content takedowns. The stayed cases include petitions by X Corp and the DigiPub News India Foundation in the Karnataka High Court, and by comedian Kunal Kamra and senior advocate Haresh Jagtiani in the Bombay High Court. The petitioners argue that Section 79 is a safe-harbour provision, not an independent takedown mechanism, and that binding content-blocking powers should flow only through Section 69A of the IT Act, which carries stronger procedural safeguards. The Supreme Court has signalled it may decide the underlying constitutional question itself, with the matter listed for further hearing.

Analysis

Industry groups and digital rights organisations have raised similar concerns about the compressed timelines, arguing that a three-hour window leaves little room for platforms to verify an order's authenticity and scope before acting, particularly for smaller or domestic intermediaries without round-the-clock legal staff. The government has not published a detailed rationale for the shortened windows beyond general statements about the need for faster enforcement against unlawful content, including deepfakes and impersonation material.

Comparisons to other jurisdictions vary depending on which category of content is being measured. The European Union's Digital Services Act does not set a fixed hourly deadline for general unlawful content, requiring only removal "in a timely manner." A stricter one-hour standard exists under a separate EU regulation, but it applies narrowly to terrorist content referred by a designated national authority, not to the broader category of unlawful content covered by India's rule. Government officials have not directly addressed this distinction in public statements, though platforms and legal commentators have pointed to it as a key difference when assessing how the Indian timeline compares internationally.

The pending Supreme Court litigation adds a layer of uncertainty. The petitioners' core argument is that the Sahyog portal and the underlying rule bypass procedural safeguards that the Supreme Court itself established in its 2015 Shreya Singhal judgment, which held that takedown orders must follow a defined legal process. The government has defended the framework as a lawful due-diligence mechanism under Section 79. Until the Supreme Court rules on the transfer petitions and the underlying constitutional questions, both the three-hour timeline and the broader legal basis for it remain subject to potential revision. MeitY's decision to reiterate the shortened timelines while that litigation is pending has been read by some commentators as a signal that the government does not expect the timelines themselves to be disturbed, though this is an inference rather than something officials have stated directly.