The Tamil Nadu government has passed an order to set up a fact-check Unit that will fact-check news related to the state government across all media platforms. A Government Order from the Tamil Development and Information Department on October 6 said that a Central Task Force will operate under the fact-check Unit and will be led by a Mission Director. Iyan Karthikeyan has been appointed as the Mission Director of this fact-check unit. He is a former Editor-in-chief of YouTurn.in, which does a fact-check of social media content.
The GO says that with the growth of social media, there has been a rise in hate speech, misinformation and disinformation and this has necessitated the creation of a fact-check unit by the government. But the GO then states that the unit will fact-check all media platforms, including perhaps news outlets. “The objective of the fact-check Unit is to act as a deterrent to the perpetrators/creators and disseminators of fake news and mis-information. The unit will check the authenticity of information related to the Government of Tamil Nadu across all media platforms. The veracity of information related to the announcements, policies, schemes, guidelines and initiatives of Government of Tamil Nadu shall be checked.”
As in the case of the Union government’s much criticised fact-check unit, the Tamil Nadu government’s unit also will focus on government related news or information. The Union Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeITy), on April 7, notified amendments to the 2021 IT Rules and allowed a fact-check entity to decide whether information shared on social media platforms or news media organizations are ‘fake’ or not. The amendment also gave this entity the power to ask social media platforms to remove false, fake or misleading information or news. The Tamil Nadu GO does not say that the fact-check unit can ask for posts to be taken down, it will however refer cases to the legal and police department. Sources in the Tamil Nadu government also insisted that the primary focus of this fact-check unit would be to curb hate speech.
How it will work
Besides social media platforms, the Central Task Force will take up complaints regarding information related to ministries, departments, public sector entities etc. They can also take matters suo motu to fact-check any piece of information related to the state government that is available on the media. The GO noted that the unit will segregate the information to see if it falls within the purview of the fact-checking unit and then use various fact-checking tools to check for authenticity.
The information will then be segregated into an actionable pool and non-actionable pool. Misinformation and disinformation that is classified under the actionable pool will be handed over to the government’s legal and police departments for further action. The fact-check unit will also create awareness among people. A Mission Director will head the central task force of the unit. The project director will assist the mission director in coordinating training, and content writing. A joint director from the Information and Public Relations Department will coordinate public campaigns and awareness and also collect information on fake news, misinformation, disinformation and hate speech to analyse the content received and to fact-check them. Each district will have one district analysis team with two or three members depending upon the total number of taluks in the district.
In 2023, the Congress-led Karnataka government created a fact-checking unit to curb fake news on social media platforms. During a press meet in September this year, Priyank Kharge, the State Information Technology, and BioTechnology Minister said that news organisations that post disinformation or misinformation could face legal consequences. This announcement too was met with skepticism and criticism. The Editors Guild of India said that “any efforts to check fake news content have to be by independent bodies that are not under the sole purview of the government, lest they become tools to clamp down on voices of dissent.”
Read: Karnataka govt makes framework for ‘fact-check’ unit, media orgs may face legal action