Telegram’s “unique platform architecture”, including its bot ecosystem, mirror channels and anonymity-enhancing features, was the Centre’s core defence of the temporary blocking order before the Delhi High Court on Thursday. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta argued that Telegram’s design allows unlawful activity to rapidly re-emerge despite takedown efforts, while Attorney General R. Venkataramani contended that a platform unable to effectively address risks arising from its own architecture could not rely solely on proportionality arguments.

A single-judge vacation bench of Justice Tejas Karia reserved judgment in Telegram’s challenge to the June 16 blocking order and directed both parties to file submissions by 7 pm on June 18. The order blocks Telegram in India until June 22, ahead of the June 21 NEET-UG re-examination, and separately requires the platform to disable editing of previously sent messages until June 30.

Telegram’s architecture and unique challenges: Solicitor General Tushar Mehta argued that Telegram’s design itself creates challenges that do not exist on other platforms. Relying on Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) reports from 2024, 2025 and 2026, including a detailed report dated June 10, 2026, Mehta argued that Telegram possesses “certain technical and architectural features that distinguish it from other intermediaries” and “facilitate rapid dissemination and persistence of unlawful content despite takedown measures” while creating challenges for law enforcement agencies. He told the court that the reports consistently found Telegram’s architecture to be uniquely resistant to conventional enforcement measures.

According to the government, Telegram’s architecture enables unlawful activity to quickly reappear even after enforcement action. Among the features cited by the Centre were:

• A single account’s ability to create multiple bots;
• Mirror bots that can be recreated within minutes;
• Username-based communication that conceals user identities;
• Cloud-based storage and synchronisation, along with deletion of user data; and
• Large public channels with up to 2 lakh members.

Government highlights bots on Telegram: “In Telegram, one account user can create 40 bots,” the Solicitor General argued, pointing out that WhatsApp allows only one per user. He further submitted that this encourages the multiplication of unlawful activity. “The removal and/or disabling of a particular bot does not necessarily eliminate the underlying unlawful activity,” he said. “Mirror bots having identical functionality, content and objectives can be recreated within minutes under different names or identifiers.”

At another point, he claimed that blocked users could rapidly migrate to replacement channels. “Once the bot is blocked, it is redirected to another mirror bot,” he said. Justice Karia interjected to clarify whether such migration could happen automatically. “No human intervention is necessary,” Mehta responded.

Attorney General on proportionality and responsibility: Attorney General R. Venkataramani urged the court not to assess the blocking order through a conventional proportionality lens, arguing that Telegram’s inability to effectively address risks arising from its own architecture weakened its reliance on fundamental rights arguments. “The order is a complete order in itself. It applies its mind to all relevant factors,” he submitted. More significantly, he argued that “somebody who cannot have accountability or discharge responsibility cannot plead proportionality”.

According to Venkataramani, the case presented a “very unique and peculiar situation”, making it inappropriate to apply proportionality “indiscriminately”. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta similarly said he is arguing from a public order lens, rather than the sovereignty concerns mentioned in the order.

Court on Section 79 compliance and blocking under 69A: When Telegram pointed to the channels, bots and URLs it had removed, the court acknowledged those actions but questioned whether they were sufficient to address the concerns raised by authorities.

“The measures which you have deployed are not satisfactory to meet the requirement,” the bench observed, asking Telegram: “What is your answer to those submissions?”

Later, Justice Karia emphasised that the dispute was not simply about whether Telegram had taken action, but whether those actions adequately addressed the situation. “It’s about sufficiency of what you have done,” he said. “If you have done which is not sufficient, which does not meet the requirement of the situation, then Section 69A power is always available.”

The judge also noted that the discussions between Telegram and the government were distinct from the blocking process itself. “The discussion which was going on between the government and you was not in context of 69A. 69A doesn’t require any discussion,” the court observed.

Government says Telegram was not proactive: Another dispute centred on whether Telegram had been sufficiently proactive. The government argued that Telegram primarily acted after receiving complaints or takedown requests rather than proactively identifying unlawful content.

Referring to a June 3 meeting between officials and Telegram representatives, the government told the court that authorities had informed the company that “the platform was and is legally required to proactively identify illegal content”. “It was stated that the government accepted that Telegram took action post-facto, but proactive measures were not undertaken,” the Centre submitted.

The government also argued that it had repeatedly proposed less restrictive alternatives before invoking its blocking powers. According to Mehta, officials suggested measures such as proactive filtering, device-level blocking and hash-based detection systems. “It was also suggested that the platform may consider blocking at the IMEI device level or explore a hash system for detecting unlawful content,” he said.

Telegram’s arguments: Telegram’s counsel argued that the government had failed to consider the platform’s explanations and responses before concluding that it had not taken effective preventive measures.

Among the key arguments raised were:

• Telegram disputed the government’s claim that it lacked proactive moderation tools. Referring to clarifications submitted after the June 3 meeting, its counsel said the platform already employed “AI, hash-based detection, user reporting, and other technical and organisational measures” to identify and remove unlawful content.
• The platform argued that examination-related content presents unique moderation challenges because it is often “contextual and subjective in nature” and cannot always be identified as easily as other categories of unlawful content.
• Responding to criticism that a simple search for terms such as “NEET paper” could identify offending channels, Telegram said search signals and keywords already form part of its moderation framework and are continuously used to detect examination fraud and paper leak content.
• However, Telegram argued that “outright blocking or banning of particular keywords or phrases does not appear to be an appropriate solution”. Such terms could be used in legitimate contexts by “students, educational stakeholders, media organisations, and news reporting relating to the issue”.
• The platform noted that “thousands and lakhs of students” use Telegram for study groups, academic discussions, educational material and examination-related discussions. “Accordingly, the mere presence of a particular keyword or phrase cannot by itself be treated as indicative of unlawful activity,” its counsel argued.
• Telegram also pointed to its compliance efforts, stating that it had independently disabled more than 900 URLs, channels, bots and accounts, in addition to roughly 400 entities specifically identified by authorities.

Court’s questions on proportionality: While acknowledging the fallout from the NEET controversy and the need to ensure a fair re-examination, the court questioned whether concerns about examination fraud justified restricting access to an entire platform. “To curb that one particular instance, can you block the entire app?” Justice Karia asked. 

He also observed that Telegram’s core grievance appeared to be the government’s decision to impose a platform-wide restriction rather than target specific channels, users or messages. Later, the bench framed a central question in the case: “In regard to 150 million users, how can we stop their right to communicate with each other just because of this one set of group of citizens who are appearing in examination?”

Also read:

• “Complete non-application of mind”: Telegram tells Delhi HC on government’s platform restriction
• Telegram CEO Pavel Durov claims Reliance is sabotaging Telegram access for users outside India
• Explained: Is the Telegram restriction in India necessary or disproportionate?