Widely define fake news that is considered “anti-peaceism” and “insult to eternal symbols”; Social media was convicted of posting “fake news” as a decision by a committee headed by the State Information and Broadcasting Minister for users, sentenced to seven years to jail; Establishment of special courts to deal with cases under law – Karnataka’s bill -free speech to curb fake news and raises many questions about the state’s overache.
Karnataka misinformation and fake news (prohibition) bill, 2025, in the name of restricting misinformation and fake news, a committee of MPs empowers to labeled as “fake news” to identify and label the content on social media. This is the first state law of its kind to deal with digital platforms and free speech.
“Any social media users, if found guilty by the authority for posting fake news on social media platforms, will be punished with imprisonment that can grow up to seven years and be fined which can increase with Rs 10 lakh or both,” the bill has been said.
Section 5 of the bill includes “Authority”, Kannada and Culture Information Minister and Broadcasting as the East-Current Chairman; Every member of the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council is to be nominated by their respective homes; Two representatives of social media platforms appointed by the state government and one senior bureaucrat as Secretary.
The mandate of this authority is “to ensure a complete ban on promotion and proliferation of fake news” including “posting of materials that are derogatory and obscene, including feminism and humiliation for the dignity of the woman”; “Disrespect of eternal symbols and beliefs” among others.
The authority has also been assigned to ensure that “only those materials (s) have been posted on social media platforms which are based on authentic research on subjects related to science, history, religion, philosophy, literature.”
The bill came to the fore last September as an inequality decision by the Bombay High Court, which was obstructed as a major provision of the revised Information Technology (IT) Rules, 2021, which emphasized the government to identify the government to identify “fake news” on social media platforms through “Fact Czech Unit” (FCU). The court had admitted that the lack of judicial inspection in the rules was unconstitutional.
The bill also makes a provision to grant anticipatory bail for crimes under the proposed law to Indian city security Sanhita.
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Details of fake news and misinformation bills widen the scope of misuse and misuse. For example, fake news is described as “purely fabricated material” and “editing as audio or video under Section 2 (i) of the bill, resulting in deformation of facts and/or reference.” The wrong information is defined as “deliberately or carelessly defined as making a wrong or wrong statement of the fact.”
The provision states that “opinion, religious or philosophical preaching, satire, comedy or any other form of parody or artistic expression” has been freed from the definition. The formation of “artistic expression” is not defined in the bill.
In January 2024, Justice Gautam Patel of Bombay HC also killed the IT rules of the Center for unclear and overbod words such as “fake,” wrong, “and” misleading “. The ruling said, “Both ambiguity and overbred are associated with the concept of chilling effects.”
The decision in Landmark 2013 at Shreya Singhal V Union of India, dropping down the 66A of the Information Technology Act, allowing the material to be blocked, the court emphasized that unclear definitions could not be appropriate to curb free speech.
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“Information that can be grossly aggressive or which causes annoyance or discomfort, is undefined words that take very large amounts of protected and innocent speech in the net. A person can be unwanted about any person that broadcasts on internet information, who can be clear about any kind of person. Journal, inconvenience or some can be grossed for any kind.
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