What is Section 66A of the IT Act? Here is All the Information for UPSC Preparation

The UPSC exam comprises questions from around the globe and India. You must know all the factors going on in the country, especially the amendments done to the provinces or acts and judgments released by the apex court. All the candidates of UPSC keep themselves aware of the factual details regarding the happenings or mishappenings in the country

There are many noticeable incidents of comments, information sharing, expressing thoughts by an individual to a wider and huge audience on the internet that has punished the people for doing such criminal activities. This has led to discussion and debate on the ambit of the Section and its applicability to such actions.

If you are looking for: What is section 66a of the IT act? You must keep reading this whole article and grab the updated information.

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Section 66 A of the IT Act for – Important UPSC Notes

Section 66 A of Information Technology determines the illegal or wrong usage of the computer or any other digital device for sending offensive messages to any citizen. It comes under criminal activity. You cannot send illegal and unwanted messages to any person in the country. If you are doing so, you will be punishabke under this act. If you are sending any sort of unlawful and offensive messages to anyone then that is

#a. Grossly offensive;

#b. False and meant for causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred, or ill will;

#c. Meant to deceive or mislead the recipient about the origin of such messages, etc, shall be punishable with imprisonment up to three years and with a fine.

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The Supreme Court on Section 66 A of IT ACT

This act was scrapped by the Supreme Court of India a few years ago but there are still nuances done under it. The Supreme Court has shown its shocking reaction to the fact that the implementation of this act is not seen yet. People are doing these criminal activities even more now. When the notice regarding this act came during the hearing of a plea filed by PUCL. It was looked at and pointed out that it has been 7 years of the law being struck down and still the act is not strictly implemented.

According to March 2021, it is clear that a total of 745 cases are still pending and active before the district courts in 11 states, wherein the accused persons are being prosecuted for offences under Section 66A of the IT Act. The misuse of information technology and the internet is increasing to an extent of a hectic zone. Some people are victims of it just for using any social media platform. It is evident that even after March 2015, when the Shreya Singhal Judgment came out for Section 66A, 1,307 cases were registered under the law. If we are seeing the situation today, it is the worst.

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Why is this Important for UPSC Preparation?

If you are preparing for the civil services examination, you must know all the relevant factors of this case. According to the Attorney General of India, KK Venugopal, the verdict is confusing the officials. He said that after being declared unconstitutional, this can’t happen. He added, “If your lordships see the IT Act book, there is only a small asterisk and a footnote that says it was deleted by order of the Supreme court. No one reads the footnote,”. This might be the reason why it is still not stopping.

The most reputed justice RF Nariman stated that perhaps, the implementation is the key problem. Section 66 says that you are punishable under the law if you have any offensive communication through the internet. It was said as vague and arbitrary in the year 2015. According to the plea made, it is inspected that 381 cases of this act have been registered in Maharashtra, 295 in Jharkhand, and 245 in UP since the 2015 Supreme Court judgment. It needs to be improvised and implemented strongly for the welfare of the people.

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Government Reactions

The government of India agrees to the fact that it is highly unlawful to send offensive messages or degrade the identity of the personality through social media. The central government has issued guidelines for the protection of section 66a. Under these guidelines, it was said that the approval of the Deputy Commissioner or Inspector General of Police is mandatory before a police officer or police station could register a complaint under Section 66(A). These cases must be tackled intellectually so that unlawful activities could be minimized.

The central government has also said that the Supreme Court of India must take improvised actions over this case to relieve the people from using social media. Internet is an essential part of everyone’s life. Everyone is active on social media for awareness, interaction, knowledge, and many other things. People must feel safe while using it and there should be no harm to any public figure or country folks.

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UPSC Notes

All the candidates of the UPSC preparation must know the updated verdicts by the Supreme Court of India and cases under which the actions are being taken. You are aspiring to be posted to the most dignified positions in India. You will have to acknowledge the illegal activities being done in society and change them for the betterment and upliftment of society. You must pen down all the required materials for the examination and read it properly so that it goes into your permanent memory. It becomes difficult to remember the dates and years of each verdict but when you learn it in a sequence you grab it properly.

Need of Orientation for UPSC

Therefore, you must be composed and organized. Do not get stressed out after watching and reading about the verdicts, rather read it in a way that this is something vital to be changed in society. You must relate the dates to something or events then it will be easy for you to remember all of them. The true aspirant will calmly listen to the happenings of the country so that it gets shifted to the never erased memory. It will make you a person of intellect and you will easily get all your ambitions in life including the highest scores in CSE.

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Conclusion

If you are preparing for the UPSC exam, you must be aware of all the knowledge of the things going around you. This brings improvement in your UPSC preparation. All the candidates are advised to read the newspapers daily to grasp the authentic current affairs of the nation. We hope that by reading this article, you must have increased your knowledge about section 66a of the IT act. If you have any queries or confusion related to the civil service examination, you should go to the UPSC Pathshala and enhance your learning. You will get the opportunity to know about several important things for this exam. The experts of different fields will let you know about the information regarding their area. Once you visit the website, all the problems will be reduced from your shoulders and you can then get ready for your exam without any miserably.