PM's roadmap to protection of fundamental rights, top quotes by MoS Chandrasekhar to Arnab

Day after the announcement of amendments in the Information and Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, the Union Minister of State for Entrepreneurship, Skill Development, Electronics & Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar highlighted that the rules have been made so that every Indian citizen is respected on social media platforms. 

While speaking exclusively to Republic Media Network's Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami on the 'Nation Wants to Know', MoS Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that the Centre, as a legal process for the first time, has ensured the protection of the fundamental rights of citizens on foreign platforms by bringing them under the ambit of the IT Rules.       

Watch the full interview here:

Here are the top 10 quotes of MoS Rajeev Chandrasekhar that he mentioned during 'Nation Wants to Know':

"IT rules from last two years laid the basis that Internet in India should be open, safe and trusted and accountable for all the Digital Nagrik and Digital citizens of India. Our PM who has unleashed so much innovation in the country has laid out a roadmap for the next decade being a huge digital transformation and has set a goal of a trillion dollar digital economy by 2026."

"Government is not supervising the internet. The boundary conditions the Modi government uses for the tech space is that the internet must be open- free from any state or any corporate influence. The internet must be safe & trusted because they are real people who use the Internet. Their safety and trust in the internet should always be maintained. The Internet must have accountability between big tech platforms and users."

"Bad for the Indian citizens, bad for the Digital Nagrik includes- cyber security, cyber frauds, child sexual abuse, trafficking of people, pornography, invasion of other’s privacy. There has a whole series of things. There are 10 conditions that have been laid down in rules which the intermediaries are obliged to follow."

"I'll be very clear that the rules are not designed for company A or company B. Essentially, I repeat again. Our goal and objective is to partner with every internet intermediary with the ultimate goal that the internet is a space where 120 crore Indians can safely come and do what they do. I think it is very important to understand that this is not adversarial to any platform. These are rules that platforms must follow in India if they have to maintain the status of being intermediaries.

"If any intermediary chooses to not follow the rules; it's completely up to them, it is their choice, they (will) lose the status of being an intermediary almost immediately. Of course, we are a democracy. We are a country with a robust judicial system. They have the right whether they are an American company or an Indian company, they have the right to go to court and seek justice for what they believe is unfair or wrong. But the consequences of not following rules are clear."

"Frankly, these rules and regulations apply to any platform regardless of who their owner is, what the ideology of the owner is or what the ideology of the users of the platform is. These are rules to ensure that the internet in India is always safe."

"The right to no discrimination, right to free speech, right to privacy, and life, cannot be violated by any platform. The government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi Ji is a trusty of these fundamental rights. We don't need a foreign platform or a foreign media house, or their friends in Delhi to tell us about protecting the Constitutional rights of Indian citizens. We consider it our duty. We consider our duty to deliver our citizens a safe internet, and to deliver accountable relationships between big tech platforms and the Indian citizen, and the rules are meant to do that."

"Grievance Appellate Committee is not a power-grab, recourse if the redressal process of the platform is insufficient. We've noticed many platforms have appointed grievance officers naam-ke-vaaste only. That's unacceptable."

"Every Indian digital citizen, who is using a service or product on the digital platform, must have his or her grievance 100% addressed.

"We're the largest connected democracy in the World. This is not a small internet, it's going to be one of the largest cyberspaces in the world. We want it to be a partnership between the government, the industry and the user."