By Prof. Balraj Chauhan and Deepshikha Trivedi
Lucknow: Freedom of speech, the lifeblood of democracy, is under unprecedented stress worldwide. Across continents, the right to speak, challenge, and dissent is being pulled apart from two extremes. In the United States, unregulated social media amplifies conspiracy theories, misinformation, and outrage—sometimes spilling into real-world violence. In India, the pendulum swings the other way: digital regulation, designed to ensure responsibility, increasingly risks narrowing space for dissent. In Nepal, attempts to curb online expression triggered mass unrest.
Together, these experiences expose a paradox of our times — the same digital tools that empower voices can also endanger them, depending on how they are governed. The real battleground of free speech today lies not in the courtroom or the street, but in the code — algorithms that now decide what billions see, share, and believe.
The erosion of trust began years ago. The Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018 revealed how data harvested from millions of Facebook users was weaponised to influence elections across the United States, the United Kingdom, and parts of India. What began as targeted advertising became large-scale political engineering. The architecture built to sell products proved equally capable of selling ideologies.
Since then, platforms engineered to connect people have often become engines of division. In the U.S., the collapse of editorial filters has allowed misinformation and hate to spread like contagion. The storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, wasn’t hatched in secrecy — it was livestreamed, liked, and shared into existence. Attention became currency; outrage, its broker. The recent killing of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk and the earlier attack on Minnesota legislator Melissa Hortman reignited this debate, as online echo chambers magnified polarisation and fear. When freedom of speech becomes detached from responsibility, the result is not liberty but chaos.
Yet even in this turbulence, citizens sometimes reclaim the narrative. When comedian Jimmy Kimmel was briefly suspended by ABC for his remarks on the hysteria surrounding Kirk’s death, viewers revolted online. The show was reinstated within days — a small but powerful reminder that the democratic instinct to defend speech still survives; it simply has to outshout the algorithm.
India represents a more complex challenge. Here, technology and governance have merged in the digital public sphere. The Constitution guarantees freedom of speech under Article 19(1)(a), but reasonable restrictions under Article 19(2) allow the State to regulate content on broad grounds such as public order or decency. The Sahyog Portal, introduced under the IT Rules 2021, illustrates how this balance is evolving. Officially created to coordinate the removal of harmful content — terrorism, hate speech, or child abuse — the system also enables swift takedowns of online material flagged as unlawful or misleading. While its stated purpose is legitimate, its operation lacks independent review or public transparency.
The recent X Corp v. Union of India case highlighted this tension. X Corp, which runs the platform now called X (formerly Twitter), challenged the government’s use of Section 79(3)(b) of the Information Technology Act — a “safe harbour” provision meant to protect intermediaries — as a de facto blocking power, bypassing safeguards under Section 69A. Court documents show that more than 1,400 blocking orders were issued between March 2024 and June 2025, over 70 percent through Sahyog. The Karnataka High Court upheld the government’s authority but noted that the process needed greater clarity. Crucially, there are no direct penalties for non-compliance — yet the threat of losing safe-harbour protection, which shields platforms from liability for user content, drives them to over-comply. The result is quiet restraint: platforms censor pre-emptively, and users self-censor instinctively. Free speech survives — but often, it whispers or tones down.
This does not necessarily imply deliberate misuse; rather, it exposes how algorithmic systems can entrench control unintentionally. Platforms, seeking to align with state norms or avoid penalties, design algorithms that automatically restrict the reach of “sensitive” content. The same automated tools that amplify entertainment or political slogans can invisibly dampen dissenting voices. This is regulation by architecture — not always commanded, but deeply conditioned.
The consequences are subtle but significant. Posts questioning dominant narratives or powerful interests sometimes vanish without explanation. Investigative journalism faces algorithmic invisibility, not overt bans. Each unaccounted takedown chips away at the constitutional promise of open debate. The line between moderation and manipulation grows thinner with each click.
Nepal offers a more direct warning. In September 2025, amid youth-led protests against corruption, the government banned Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and X. The blackout, intended to restore order, ignited fury. Protests intensified, resulting in dozens of deaths and thousands of injuries. The state learned too late that cutting communication does not quell dissent — it magnifies it.
Globally, some democracies have found more balanced paths. Germany mandates quick removal of illegal content but under judicial oversight. Canada allows restrictions only when demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society, while Nordic nations rely on transparency and public trust rather than coercion. These examples show that it is possible to protect citizens from harm without silencing them.
India’s digital framework is still evolving. It must reconcile the imperative of security with the ethos of liberty. The challenge is not just to regulate speech but to ensure that regulation does not become the algorithmic gatekeeper of truth. Transparency, proportionality, and public oversight — not opacity and automation — are the foundations of democratic speech in the digital age.
The danger is not merely that social media spreads falsehoods. The deeper danger is that the same algorithms built to connect societies can now quietly control them — amplifying narratives in one place, muting dissent in another. The task before democracies is to reclaim these tools before they rewrite the meaning of free expression itself. The algorithm may decide who speaks, but it must not decide who listens.
About the Authors
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Prof. Balraj Chauhan, State Lead of CRISP-UP, former President of the Indian Society of Criminology, and former Vice-Chancellor of three National Law Universities, is a distinguished scholar of criminal law and legal education.
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Deepshikha Trivedi is a Research Scholar at the Faculty of Law, University of Delhi, and a Fellow with CRISP-UP.
