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Pavel Durov Criticizes India's Telegram Ban and Platform Restrictions

Wednesday, June 17, 2026
5 min read
Pavel Durov Criticizes India's Telegram Ban and Platform Restrictions

Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram, stepped in to criticize what the Indian government did. He argued that banning the messaging platform for a week really punishes over 150 million users in the country.

The ban itself didn't stop anything, he said. The leaks just moved over to other apps. That was his main point floating around right now.

He posted this on X. It wasn’t some perfectly balanced statement. It felt more immediate. He basically threw it out there: India banned Telegram because people shared leaked exam questions. But that move hits 150 million regular users, not the insiders who actually leaked the materials. And honestly? The ban hasn't stopped anything at all.

This whole situation comes amid a lot of debate about these kinds of platform-wide restrictions. Are they even working to stop things online?

India temporarily locked down the messaging app because of this exam issue. They were worried it was being used for scams targeting candidates preparing for some national medical entrance test. The test itself had already been messy, full of rumors about paper leaks. That’s why millions of results got cancelled last month.

The government blocked access until June 22nd, ahead of the NEET re-examination date. That re-test is set for June 21st across various centers. It followed some recommendations from the National Testing Agency, or NTA. They said the restriction was only meant to cover the exam period and right after it.

The NTA regretted the inconvenience caused to lakhs of citizens using the platform during this time. A predictable response, perhaps.

But there’s another angle here. The government also pushed Telegram to disable its message-editing feature until June 30th. This was tied directly into concerns about how that feature could be abused.

The NTA pointed out exactly why they made this move. They claimed the editing feature had been used before, not just for normal communication. It let admins edit posted messages and swap attached files like PDFs while keeping the original timestamp intact.

It turned out that capability was exploited to fabricate what looked like "paper leak" evidence. Administrators could basically create after-the-event artifacts.

Telegram was involved in these cheating rackets targeting those NEET candidates, they said. It wasn't just about sharing a file; it was organized fraud. The agency noted they had already taken action, removing channels and bots that were pushing fraudulent claims about the question papers. But platform intervention became necessary when those initial steps didn't seem enough.

Both measures the app block and disabling editing were put in place for public order. They were a response to organized rackets trying to defraud people taking that re-examination. It felt less like targeted policing and more like damage control, you know? Dealing with the fallout of what already happened.

Written by Gree News Team — Senior Editorial Board

Gree News Team covers international news and global affairs at Gree News. Our collective of senior editors is dedicated to providing independent, accurate, and responsible journalism for a global audience.

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