India’s Internet Shutdowns Hurt Its Most Vulnerable: Report

Frequent internet shutdowns in India have a disproportionately negative impact on impoverished communities that rely on the government's social protection programs for sustenance, a new report released by Human Rights Watch and Internet Freedom Foundation said.

The 82-page report titled "No Internet Means No Work, No Pay, No Food': Internet Shutdowns Deny Access to Basic Rights in 'Digital India," stated that since 2018, India has shut down the internet more than any other country in the world.

"Access to the internet is not only essential for freedom of expression and association, but also for a range of economic and social rights," it added.

Of 28 states in the country, 18 shut down the internet at least once in the last three years. Eleven states out of these-Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Manipur, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and Telangana-did not publish suspension orders as directed by the Supreme Court.

"The local authorities used shutdowns in 54 cases to prevent or in response to protests, 37 to prevent cheating in school examinations or in exams for government jobs, 18 in response to communal violence, and 18 for other law and order concerns," the report highlighted.

"India was responsible for the most shutdowns in 2022, for the fifth consecutive year, with 84 shutdowns out of 187 globally. While this report covers shutdowns up until December 2022, in March 2023, the entire state of Punjab had been placed under a three-day mobile internet blackout to track down a separatist leader. In May, the internet was completely blocked on both mobile and fixed line services in Manipur state for weeks following violent ethnic clashes," the report said.

Meanwhile, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government's key digitization initiatives are being harmed by internet shutdowns. "Digital connectivity should become as much a basic right as access to school," Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said in 2015, and since then, his government has assiduously pursued this policy. The "Digital India" project aims to use technology to improve delivery of public services and implement government programs.

"This has made the Internet essential for access to government welfare schemes (or programs) for social protection, including its right to work guarantee, its public distribution system under the Food Security Act, and for e-governance in rural areas. The population, particularly marginalized communities, has become particularly vulnerable during internet shutdowns. "All the government schemes are now dependent on the internet, so you can no longer get access to any of it without internet; even getting food rations require biometric authentication," said Laavanya Tamang, a senior researcher at LibTech India, a nonprofit organization that works on improving public service delivery in India.

This joint report by Human Rights Watch and Internet Freedom Foundation, based on research in India and over 70 interviews, documents the harm caused by internet shutdowns.