Telegram Ban: Company moves court against government order; CEO says the ban won't change anything

Telegram Ban in India: The government has imposed a temporary ban on Telegram until the NEET (UG) 2026 re-exam to curb paper leak incidents. Telegram has approached the Delhi High Court against this order.

Telegram Ban in India: To prevent paper leaks, the Government of India imposed a temporary ban on Telegram on Tuesday. Telegram has now moved the court to challenge this decision and seek relief. The matter is scheduled for a hearing today. Notably, the government has banned access to Telegram until June 22 and ordered the disabling of its message-editing feature until June 30. This decision was taken in light of the use of apps like Telegram in exam leak incidents.

Telegram CEO: 150 million users are being punished

Reacting to the government's order, Telegram's founder criticized the move. He wrote on X that the Indian government banned Telegram for a week because some users shared leaked exam papers on the platform. He stated that this punishes over 150 million Telegram users rather than the insiders who actually leaked the papers. He added that the ban hasn't stopped anything; leaks are now occurring via other apps.

Durov: Several steps taken to curb paper leaks

In a subsequent post, Durov detailed the actions taken against accounts involved in paper leaks and related activities. He wrote that over the past few weeks, they had removed hundreds of channels sharing exam materials and associated scams. He added that they are making the "edited" label more visible to prevent backdating scams. He maintained that banning Telegram—even temporarily—is wrong.

Why was only Telegram banned? The National Testing Agency (NTA) states that fraudulent networks are using Telegram groups to target candidates preparing for the NEET (UG) 2026 re-exam. The government has taken this decision under IT laws to prevent individuals involved in paper leak incidents from utilizing the platform. Additionally, certain features of Telegram—such as the ability to create large groups, maintain secrecy, and share large files—have contributed to this decision, as these capabilities can be exploited by those running cheating networks.