Elon Musk’s X has filed a new lawsuit against the Indian government, accusing the country’s IT ministry of unlawfully extending its censorship authority. The platform claims that this expansion makes it easier to remove online content and grants numerous government officials the power to enforce takedown orders.
The legal battle between X and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration over content removal has now intensified. The lawsuit also comes as Musk advances plans to launch Starlink and Tesla in India.
In a court filing dated March 5, X argues that India’s IT ministry is instructing other government departments to use a platform introduced by the Ministry of Home Affairs last year for issuing content blocking orders. Social media companies are also being pressured to join the platform.
X contends that this system bypasses India’s legal safeguards, which typically allow content removal only in cases related to sovereignty or public order and require oversight from senior officials. The IT ministry redirected Reuters’ request for comment to the home affairs ministry, which has yet to respond.
Calling the system an “impermissible parallel mechanism” that leads to “unrestricted censorship” in India, X is seeking to overturn the directive.
X’s legal filing, first reported by the media on Thursday, remains private. The case was briefly heard in Karnataka’s High Court earlier this week, with a final ruling now scheduled for March 27.
This is not X’s first dispute with Indian authorities. In 2021, when the platform was still known as Twitter, it clashed with the government over orders to block tweets related to farmer protests. Though it eventually complied after public pressure from officials, its legal challenge against that directive is still ongoing in Indian courts.
