The Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, utilizing the emergency powers under the IT Rules, 2021, has issued orders on 16.08.2022 for blocking of 8 YouTube based news channels, 1 Facebook account, and two Facebook posts. The blocked YouTube channels had a cumulative viewership of over 114 crore, were subscribed by over 85 lakh users.
The purpose of the content published by some of these YouTube channels was to spread hatred among religious communities in India. False claims were made in various videos of the blocked YouTube channels.