Inquiry revealed that the blocking committee of the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) has confirmed the emergency blocking order of the official X (formerly Twitter) account of Jharkhand Congress on Thursday (May 2) for tweeting the doctored video of Union Home Minister and Bharatiya Janata Paty (BJP) leader Amit Shah on April 28. 

As per hindustantimes.com report, the “final order is a temporary blocking order under which the @INCJharkhand will not be accessible within India until the end of the elections after which the account can be restored. The account remains visible outside India.” 

 Official information accessed indicate that this blocking order was requested by the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) of the ministry of home affairs. The I4C’s threat analysis unit has been looking at the case of Shah’s doctored video. In Thursday’s meeting, this was the only blocking order that was discussed. “This is the first time Section 69A of the Information Technology Act has been used to block a political party’s social media account. 

This act comes amidst the ongoing general elections”, said the Hindustan times.com report. According to Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, the government is empowered to block content online for six specific reasons – in the interest of the sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, or to prevent incitement to the commission of any cognisable offence relating to above. 

X labelled Jharkhand Congress’s tweet as ‘Manipulated media’. As per its policy, any “synthetic, manipulated, or out-of-context media that may deceive or confuse people and lead to harm”. 

Shah’s video has been erroneously described as a ‘deepfake’ when the video was actually edited to make it seem as if he had said, “When the BJP government will come into power, we will end the unconstitutional reservation for SC, ST and OBC”. 

In the unedited video, he could be heard saying, “When the BJP government will come into power, we will end the unconstitutional reservation for Muslims. 

This is the right of Telangana’s SC, ST and OBC. This right will be given to them, and we will end reservations for Muslims.” No new content was added, but it was edited to change the meaning of the speech. 

Polls in Jharkhand's 14 Lok Sabha seats are yet to happen. The state will go to polls across the last four phases on May 13, May 20, May 25 and June 1.