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Why Amend 66A IT act

Nitish Banka
Last updated: 30 November 2012
  3 min read    Share   Bookmark


The IT act came into existence to protect the users from the crime related to electronic space, we know that India is a IT hub and a largest democratic country, That’s why we need IT laws .But Laws don’t keep pace with technology.

And at one point of time the technology surpasses and comes above the law, when this happens then the need to amend the law arises. This is what happened with the 66A IT act.

Let us first look at it what is 66A:

*[66A. Punishment for sending offensive messages through communication service, etc..- 

Any person who sends, by means of a computer resource or a communication device,-

(a) any information that is grossly offensive or has menacing character; or

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(b) any information which he knows to be false, but for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred, or ill will, persistently makes by making use of such computer resource or a communication device,

(c) any electronic mail or electronic mail message for the purpose of causing annoyance or inconvenience or to deceive or to mislead the addressee or recipient about the origin of such messages shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and with fine.


Explanation: For the purposes of this section, terms "Electronic mail" and "Electronic Mail Message" means a message or information created or transmitted or received on a computer, computer system, computer resource or communication device including attachments in text, image, audio, video and any other electronic record, which may be transmitted with the message.

The analysis of the current IT act gives an Idea that the 66A IT act is vague it talks about the information but how it gets transmitted to other person this is not mentioned as in the year 2000 there was only one way to transmit information i.e. through E-mails or may through few websites but the concept of blogging or “free speech” was not there at that time. Because information through speech is different than other form of information. For example-: we have Article 14 for freedom of speech but for intimidating someone with information passed through messages does not come under freedom of speech.

 

The 66A IT act certainly needs to be amended as IT act was passed in year 2000 at that time there was no concept of social media, the 66A act was intended to cover only email messages ,the messages of email cannot be compared with that of post on social media. The email messages are personal in nature and is generally intended to single person, But in social media you have an audience and the case of posting on the wall certainly comes under freedom of speech,  so the posting on the facebook wall must be equated with article 14, and same limitation must be applied to it rather than treating it as a message. So with current technological advancement there certainly need to amend the IT laws.

By: Nitish Banka


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Comments

12 years ago Nitish Banka

All laws need some sort of interpretation by the courts,But not all laws are misused,What happened in 66A is that the law has been misused lot of times due to its vagueness as there is no provision of implementation of Freedom of Speech in it...Freedom of speech in virtual space is not present..


12 years ago Dr V. Nageswara Rao

1. There is nothing wrong with the constitutionality of S. 66A. 2.It is again wrong to say that the setion is confined to e mails and not other social media. E mails are referred to only in Cl. C and S. 66A introductory part referrs to "by means of a computer resource or a communication device" and this and Clauses (a) and (b)cover all media. 3. It is elementary principle that many penal laws, including IPC confer discretion on the Courts and that is part of our system. 4. It is the Courts which interpret the provisions in the background of specific fact-situations and apply the law. Otherwise,even Ss. 300 and 302 can be considered as bad as they confer a lot of discretion on Courts. 5. Let us wait for Supreme Court's verdict.


12 years ago Democratic Indian

Good article and agree that Section 66A needs to be scrapped not just because of the emergence of social media but BECAUSE regardless of email or social media, the Section 66A is constitutionally void due to its vagueness. Laws need to be objective and precise, leaving no room for discretion of the executive or judiciary. Whenever you make laws that are creating wide and vague room for subjective interpretations, governmental tyranny logically follows. Laws related with regulating or effecting fundamental rights need to be narrowly tailored in least restrictive manner following the doctrine of strict scrutiny. Else the very purpose of the guarantee of fundamental rights gets defeated. For detailed understanding one may read this http://lawandotherthings.blogspot.in/2009/08/justice-sinhas-final-attempt-to-clear.html


12 years ago Ravinder Malyala

certainly, section 66A of IT Act must be amended to attain certain freedom of posting their views on the social media sites.When the act was enacted, there was no such social media sites where anyone can express their views just similar to the freedom of speech given by THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA.


12 years ago Nitish Banka

thanks for figuring out the mistake


12 years ago Aditi Ghosh

Dear Nitish, Nice article; however you may want to correct yourself - freedom of expression is guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution and not Article 14 (which talks about Right to Equality)


12 years ago kuldeep kumar

i fully agree with author.




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