New Delhi: The Editors Guild of India has condemned the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology’s (MeitY) decision to take down a harmless cartoon on Prime Minister Narendra Modi that appeared on The Wire’s Instagram page. Further, The Wire’s Instagram page was also blocked for 2 hours before the platform owner, Meta, restored it. Interestingly, The Wire was asked to “explain its conduct” 22 hours after the cartoon had been taken down and its Instagram page blocked.

It is learnt that The Wire was not given the reason why the cartoon was removed. The ostensible reason, conveyed orally to The Wire’s founders, was that the cartoon would affect the security and reputation of the country. If this indeed was the case, the excuse is laughable. Freedom of expression is a fundamental right enshrined in the Constitution. Public officials, even those holding high office, are the legitimate subject of editorial scrutiny and comment, including editorial cartoons. The incident is yet another example of the rising intolerance to comment and scrutiny on the part of the government and its representatives, and serves to tarnish India's credentials as an accommodative democracy that gives space to media, including satire and humour.

A day later, the government unsheathed the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2026, which hasten the take down of offensive and illegitimate content prepared synthetically. As pointed out by the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), the clause pertaining to the offence is ‘overbroad’ as it could hurt creative interpretation by cartoonists and “could put in place a prior restraint on synthetically generated content that is satirical, parodical, and part of political commentary and artistic expression.”

All these restrictions, as detailed in the February 10 MeitY order, come into force when the Global AI Impact Summit gets over on February 20 – the day the clauses get operationalised. The Guild demands that the government undertake a serious review of the new rules and regulations, take a hard look at all the new laws that are being wheeled in the name of taming AI that do not end up undermining media freedom and smothering free speech. The joint statement has been issued by Sanjay Kapoor, President, Raghavan Srinivasan, General Secretary and Teresa Rehman, Treasurer of the organisation.