The Delhi High Court on Wednesday told the Union government to respond to a petition filed by messaging platform Telegram challenging the government’s decision to temporarily restrict access to its services in India until June 22, ahead of the NEET-UG re-examination, The Hindu reported.

Justice Tejas Karia directed the government to file its response by Thursday and listed the matter for further hearing at 2.30 pm.

The court asked the government about the extent of the alleged illegal activity on the platform, noting that any digital service could be misused by users.

The judge, however, refrained from granting any interim relief to Telegram at this stage, Live Law reported.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology on Tuesday restricted access to Telegram till June 22, a day after the re-examination of the entrance test for medical college admissions concludes.

The ministry also directed the platform, under the Information Technology Rules, to disable its message-editing feature till June 30. The National Testing Agency, which conducts the exam, alleged that the feature was used “to fabricate after-the-event ‘paper leak’ evidence”.

A separate direction also requires Telegram to disable the editing of previously sent messages until June 30.

The NEET-UG exam was conducted on May 3, but was cancelled following allegations of a paper leak.

On Wednesday, the messaging platform approached the High Court

During the hearing on Wednesday, Solicitor General Tushar...

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