New Delhi: “When the internet is shut down, I have no work, do not get paid, cannot withdraw any money from my account and cannot even get food rations.”
This statement by a Dalit woman daily wage worker from Rajasthan begins a joint report by the Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) scrutinising India’s record as the world’s internet shutdown capital.
In No Internet Means No Work, No Pay, No Food, HRW and IFF find that internet shutdowns in India are often unwarranted, unaccounted for and deny basic rights to those poor and marginalised people that the Digital India project ironically seeks to uplift.
The 82-page report documents in detail how India’s arbitrary internet shutdowns impact people’s rights to food, work, education and health, are enabled by the Indian state and law, and run contrary to India’s international legal obligations.
It comes out as Manipur once again extends its essentially indefinite internet ban, bringing the number of days its residents have gone without internet access to 42.
Impact on vulnerable communities
A prominent focus of No Internet is the impact that internet shutdowns have on India’s poor and marginalised people, especially as the Digital India project makes internet access essential for accessing subsidised food grains, rural employment schemes and e-governance assistance in rural areas.
For instance, R.K., a man who runs a ration shop in Rajasthan, told researchers that internet shutdowns make it impossible for beneficiaries to receive their rations due to linkage with Aadhaar, a biometric database system.
A ration shop dealer in a village in Rajasthan with the machine used for Aadhaar-based biometric authentication. The machine requires internet access to authenticate biometric IDs before people can get the subsidized or free food grains to which they are entitled each month, September 2022. Photo: Human Rights Watch
“The machine uses a SIM, similar to what we insert in a mobile phone, so when there is no internet, it doesn’t work,” R.K. said.
Similarly, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS, which is more popularly known by its former acronym NREGA), a government scheme that guarantees 100 days of employment to rural households at minimum wages, has become more dependent on the internet now that labourers must log their attendance and receive payments online.
“When the internet was shut down in 2022 [during protests opposing a government policy], the block officer asked us to stop work since we could not mark our attendance,” R.C., a NREGA supervisor in Haryana told HRW and IFF. “They said they could not pay without online attendance.”
Watch: At Jantar Mantar, a Protest by Women MGNREGA Workers
Gig workers, of whom there are 7.7 million in India in 2023 and whose numbers are projected to reach 23.5 million by 2030, also live paycheque to paycheque and are likewise affected by shutdowns.
“We have to dip into savings during internet shutdowns because we do not have work, a food delivery driver from Shillong in Meghalaya said referring to how the internet is vital for workers like himself to track and deliver orders.
“We do not have a union, so there is no one to speak [to] about our problems or negotiate for us,” he added.
Rights to education and health harmed by shutdowns
No Internet devotes a section to documenting the effects of the 550-day long internet blackout in Kashmir which was imposed after its special status in the Indian constitution was abrogated.
The former state’s education and healthcare sectors were especially affected and residents’ experiences are a chilling reminder of the devastating effects that long-term shutdowns have in the 21st century.
File image of journalists protesting against the internet shutdown in Kashmir, at the Kashmir Press Club. Photo: Majid Maqbool/File
“We have lost an entire generation of children in Kashmir to internet shutdowns and the learning losses are so high that it is very difficult to breach this loss even for those children who have returned to school,” G.N. Var, president of the Private School Association in Jammu
and Kashmir told HRW and IFF.
Internet services were limited to 2G in Kashmir during the COVID-19 lockdown and were too slow for online classes to function or graduate students to attend conferences.
The lockdown also made it difficult for healthcare personnel to travel across Kashmir and keep rumours in check through websites, as 2G speeds were too slow to open them, the report says.
Also Read: Kashmiri Doctor Detained After Raising Concerns About Patients, Access to Medicine
“You could not reach the fire station, ambulance, or police. There was complete chaos … Even when the internet was restored to 2G, it was too slow … We did not have access to journals or libraries. As doctors, we have to continuously update ourselves which we could not do,” a government doctor from the region told HRW.
"For months, Kashmiris could not use online banking, make digital payments, or order supplies. There was no contact with the outside world," the report adds.
Inadequate accountability and oversight mechanisms
HRW and IFF note the impunity with which internet shutdowns are ordered by in India. While governments often claim that they suspend internet services in order to maintain public order, experts say there is no evidence to back this claim.
In fact, No Internet notes that the Indian government does not maintain data on shutdowns in the country and that a 2021 parliamentary committee affirmed the lack of data behind the assertion that internet blackouts are effective in countering terrorism or maintaining law and order.
The report also notes how district magistrates may suspend internet under Section 144 with zero accountability or oversight mechanisms in place to prevent misuse of power, and how 18 Indian states including Manipur did not publish suspension orders are directed to by the Supreme Court.
Also Read: Mapping the Rising Internet Shutdowns in India Since 2016
Recommendations
The report makes recommendations to both the Indian government as well as to the UN to ensure accountability behind India's internet shutdowns.
To the Union government, it recommends the maintenance of a national-level database of all internet shutdowns in the country. To the UN, the report says that India must be brought to account on its June 2022 G7 commitment of ensuring “an open, free, global, interoperable, reliable and secure internet.”
