Twitter founder Jack Dorsey said on Saturday that the Indian government has removed his Bluetooth-based messaging app Bitchat’s access to the country’s citizens. This is the second time Dorsey is accusing the government of blocking Bitchat after the protests in July when the popularity of the app surged during protests at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar, where mobile internet services were suspended.
“Government of India officially removes bitchat from the App Store,” Dorsey wrote on X, sharing a screenshot of an email he received from Apple. A similar order is believed to have been received by Google to restrict the app’s access on Play Store.
According to people aware of the matter, the order received from the Union ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) sought to withhold the app in India for three days.
Also Read | 12-hour internet shutdown ordered at Jantar Mantar amid protest against CEC Gyanesh Kumar
The move comes amid protests in several cities demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged problems in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. People aware of the matter told HT that the government is of the view that the app’s features may potentially be misused for anonymous coordination, unlawful assemblies, and organized criminal activities.
Bitchat had earlier become a lifeline for demonstrators, when in July, when mobile internet was repeatedly suspended around Jantar Mantar during the Cockroach Janta Party’s (CJP) protest demanding the resignation of the then education minister Dharmendra Pradhan. Protesters used the app to stay connected to people within Bluetooth range, typically a few dozen metres, as authorities suspended mobile internet services. Similar curbs were rolled out this past week. On October 2, during student-organised protests against Gyanesh Kumar, the government shut down the internet for 12 hours, from 9am to 9pm, within a 1.5-km radius of Jantar Mantar.
{{/usCountry}}Bitchat had earlier become a lifeline for demonstrators, when in July, when mobile internet was repeatedly suspended around Jantar Mantar during the Cockroach Janta Party’s (CJP) protest demanding the resignation of the then education minister Dharmendra Pradhan. Protesters used the app to stay connected to people within Bluetooth range, typically a few dozen metres, as authorities suspended mobile internet services. Similar curbs were rolled out this past week. On October 2, during student-organised protests against Gyanesh Kumar, the government shut down the internet for 12 hours, from 9am to 9pm, within a 1.5-km radius of Jantar Mantar.
{{/usCountry}}The document posted by Dorsey to back his allegation against the Indian government was an email sent by Apple’s App Review team, which stated: “per demand from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), [Bitchat] will be removed from the India App Store because it includes content that is illegal in India, which is not in compliance with the App Review Guidelines.”
According to the email, MeitY issued the takedown demand under Section 69(a) of the Information Technology Act.
The Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), an advocacy organisation, on Saturday termed the removal of BitChat from the App Store “unconstitutional”.
“Section 69A permits the blocking of unlawful information, not of a messenger for working during internet shutdowns,” it said in a post on X, demanding the MeitY to publish the blocking order and to withdraw the direction.
To be sure, orders under section 69A are confidential in nature.
IFF argued that the app has no servers and hosts no content of its own. “What travels through it is the private speech of its users, so the claim that the application ‘includes’ illegal content is incoherent,” it said.