India Tightens Online Content Censorship as Anti-Modi Protests Spread

New Delhi, India – Stand-up comedian Brijesh Jha posted a parody video on Instagram last week to protest the removal of his name, along with those of his father and sister, from the voter rolls in the eastern state of West Bengal. The video accused Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of stripping millions of voters of their voting rights at the behest of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), drawing 1.7 million views after it was posted on September 29.

Two days later, Meta – the US company that owns Instagram – took the video down, citing "local law" without further explanation. Jha, who lives in Mumbai, told Al Jazeera: "I felt so helpless that day. In this country I have only one thing – the right to vote. If that is taken away, I have nothing. As an artist, all I can do is make art or protest."

According to Jha, his video was removed because the Modi government is "afraid" following an Indian Express investigation last month that showed two of the three election commissioners had raised serious concerns about the controversial nationwide revision of voter rolls.

The process, known as the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), was launched in June last year to identify deceased, duplicate or suspect voters for removal from the rolls. So far, more than 130 million voters have been removed – nearly 14 percent of India's total electorate, most of them Muslims, a group that typically does not vote for Modi's Hindu nationalist party.

The Indian Express investigation found that two election commissioners at the same level as Kumar had formally objected at least 14 times to key decisions on the SIR made by its head. Opposition politicians and critics accuse Kumar, who was appointed by the Modi government, of acting at the BJP's behest and have demanded an independent investigation.

The revelations led to street protests across India demanding Kumar's resignation. On Tuesday, police in the capital New Delhi detained main opposition leader Rahul Gandhi and other Congress party leaders as they tried to march to the election commission's headquarters. Gandhi told reporters: "The country has been hijacked by Narendra Modi through the theft of votes. What has been done to our country is called treason. No one will escape."

In response, the BJP accused opposition parties of "working together in an effort to change the government," and a party spokesperson said they were "deliberately attacking India's democracy and constitutional institutions."

Congress protesters and their allies returned to the streets on Wednesday, after a series of marches by the satirical Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and left-wing student groups in Mumbai and New Delhi since October 2. The CJP is planning another protest in New Delhi on October 10 if Kumar has not resigned by then.

Questioning Those in Power

A striking feature of the protests is the increasingly creative language of dissent, built on humour, art and music, much of it existing online alongside the street demonstrations. But running in parallel is a crackdown targeting such memes and jokes.

According to the Indian Express, the government issued nearly 195,000 content-blocking orders to Instagram, Facebook and YouTube between March and July this year – an average of one order every 68 seconds. Dismissing the report, the government said in a statement: "With 600 million users in India posting as many as 78,703 pieces of content every 68 seconds, it is understandable that on average one of them may be unlawful."

The crackdown follows the Modi government's tightening of online content rules in February. Under the new rules, social media platforms must remove content declared "unlawful" by a government agency or court within three hours of receiving an order, down from 36 hours previously.

Among those whose work has been taken down is political cartoonist Satish Acharya. He told Al Jazeera that many of his cartoons, some of them three years old, were deleted and his Instagram account was blocked in India from September 28 until the end of the day on October 5. "At different points in history, people have used cartoons to protest and to question those in power. With social media growing, cartoons appear in many forms, sometimes as memes and reels," the 55-year-old cartoonist said, expressing hope in Gen Z because "they are fearless, creative and care about the country."

Comedian Jha, who took part in a CJP protest in Mumbai, agreed: "The more brutal the power, the softer, funnier and more artistic the protest." But Jha refused to apply to have his name restored to the voter rolls. "I think they will watch this interview and maybe I will end up in some jail. I just want to see what happens. I will not re-register," he said.

He also sent a satirical message to Modi, urging the Indian leader to stop tightening online content rules: "Please give me back my right to vote. You are a great leader with a 56-inch chest. You should not be afraid of one video."