X says Indian government ordered it to block Reuters News accounts in India
NEW DELHI (Reuters) -India's government last week directly ordered X to block more than 2,000 accounts, including two belonging to Reuters News, the social media platform said on Tuesday in a sharp public attack on "ongoing press censorship" in India.
Two Reuters News accounts - @Reuters and @ReutersWorld - were suspended for India users late on Saturday, and displayed a message saying they had been "withheld in IN (India) in response to a legal demand".
The Reuters accounts were restored on Sunday night but the status of the others was unclear.
X's statement contradicts comments by a spokesperson for India's Press Information Bureau at the weekend who said no government agency had required the withholding of Reuters handles.
"On July 3, 2025, the Indian government ordered X to block 2,355 accounts in India, including international news outlets like @Reuters and @ReutersWorld, under Section 69A of the IT Act. Non-compliance risked criminal liability," X said in its post.
"We are deeply concerned about ongoing press censorship in India due to these blocking orders. X is exploring all legal options available," it added.
Reuters could not determine what specific content the blocking demand referred to and why its removal was sought.
Section 69A of India's IT law allows the government to block public access to content "in the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of the state". Orders issued under the section are confidential in nature.
In a statement, India's IT ministry said the government had "not issued any fresh blocking order" on July 3. It did not say if an order was issued before that date.
The government did not intend to block any prominent international news channel, including Reuters, and had written to X over the weekend to unblock the news agency's accounts, the ministry said.
"X has unnecessarily exploited technicalities involved around the process and didn't unblock the URLs," it added.
The social media platform in its statement said the Indian government had asked it to restore access to @Reuters and @ReutersWorld after a "public outcry."
A Reuters spokesperson at the weekend said the news agency was working with X to get its accounts reinstated in India as soon as possible. On Tuesday, she said the agency had no further comment.
The main Reuters account has more than 25 million followers globally, while Reuters World has 718,000.
X has long been at odds with India's government over content-removal requests. In March, the company sued the federal government over a new government website the company says expands takedown powers to "countless" government officials.
The case is continuing.
India has said X wrongly labelled an official website a "censorship portal", as the website only allows tech companies to be notified about harmful online content.
(Reporting by Aditya Kalra, Munsif Vengattil and Aftab Ahmed; Editing by Jon Boyle)
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