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Informist, Tuesday, Jun. 16, 2026

 

NEW DELHI – The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology Tuesday issued an order under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, restricting access to messaging application Telegram in India till Jun. 22. The move comes days before the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test re-examination on Jun. 21, and followed a recommendation by the National Testing Agency, which conducts the exam.

 

Telegram has also been directed to disable the message-editing feature for the messages already posted till Jun. 30. The National Testing Agency said the feature has been used "to fabricate after-the-event 'paper leak' evidence in case of several recent examinations". It claimed that a channel administrator "edits an older, innocuous message to insert the actual question paper after the examination has been conducted, and the resulting chat is then circulated as purported 'evidence' that the paper was in circulation before the examination".

 

The NEET exam was conducted on May 3, but cancelled days later following reports of alleged question paper leak. The National Testing Agency has faced flak from candidates and parents for its inability to secure the question paper.

 

The agency said that a substantial number of Telegram channels, groups and bots, "whose names and content openly advertised their fraudulent and misleading purpose", have been taken down with the help of the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre. The action has helped contain "the harm caused by these rackets" to an extent. It said that over the preceding weeks, channels with names such as "PAPER LEAKED NEET", "Re-NEET 2026", "Private Mafia", and "REE NEET MAFIAA" were operating openly on Telegram.

 

These allegedly demanded sums ranging from a few thousand to several hundred thousand rupees from candidates and their families, in exchange for purported access to the re-examination paper. "The NTA reiterates that there is no such paper available outside the secured examination chain. The promise of any such material is, in every instance, a fraud," it said.  End

 

Reported by Asim Khan

Edited by Avishek Dutta

 

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