TNI Bureau: The Supreme Court today stayed a notification issued by the Centre on Wednesday to establish the Fact Checking Unit (FCU) under the Press Information Bureau to “address the challenge of fake news.”

A three-judge bench including Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra put the notification of Fact Check Unit until the Bombay High Court takes a final decision on petitions challenging the 2023 amendments to the Information Technology Rules.

With this the apex court set aside the March 11 order of the Bombay High Court to allow the central government to notify for setting up the FCU under the amended IT Rules to identify fake and false content on social media about the government.

The bench though did not comment on the merits of the case but was of the opinion that the matter concerns freedom of expression.

It is to be noted here that Stand-up comic Kunal Kamra and the Editors Guild of India had filed an appeal at the Bombay High Court seeking a direction to restrain the Centre from notifying the Fact Check Unit. However, it turned down the plea and allowed the centre to issue the notification.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), after getting a green signal from the Bombay High Court notified the PIB FCU on Wednesday to address the challenge of fake news by actively monitoring, detecting, and countering disinformation campaigns, including on social media.