Censorship
of news and manipulation of search results by Google is no new news.
Google has been censoring and filtering news, blog posts, search
results, etc for long. Most of these news and posts are those
pertaining to controversies that Indian government has created
itself.
According to the latest alert by the exclusive blog
on censorship
initiatives of Google and Indian government, Google has
once again obliged Indian government by becoming its censorship
buddy. Thus, Google
continues to censor news in India on behalf of Indian
government.
Google has censored the news item titled “Radia
Tapes, Ratan Tata’s Privacy, Fundamental Rights and Public
Interest” on 05-09-2012. At the time of writing of this
article on 06-09-2012, the news item is still censored. Even the post
pertaining to this disclosure at censorship blog has been manipulated
and censored by Google.
By censoring this news Indian government has proved
that it is not interested in public interest and protection of right
to speech and expression and right to information of its citizens.
As a matter of fact, when there is a conflict
between two fundamental rights, the public interest test becomes
important. According to Praveen Dalal, leading techno legal expert of
Asia and managing partner of ICT law firm Perry4Law,
“The Indian Constitutional Scheme is based upon “Balance of
Rights” and no right is absolute in nature. In case of conflict
between two Fundamental Rights, the Fundamental Right that
strengthens and substantiate the Public Interest should prevail”.
Hence if there is a conflict between Right to Privacy and Right to
Information/know, information can be disclosed in certain
circumstances to substantiate and strengthen Public Interest, opines
Dalal.
Thus, instead of telling the Supreme Court of India
about the source of leakage and making aware of the citizens of India
of the contents of Nira Radia tapes, all the Google and Indian
government has done is censorship of such news item.
While the traditional media is silent on these
crucial news, it is our duty to spread the word by using social media
platforms and online news mechanisms. We would update on this issue
very soon.
