India asked Google to remove content 142 times in 2009
By Sandhya

Google has always set high standards for itself when it comes to the question of supporting ordinary citizens against their Governments.  While Google is not perfect, it is clearly the most enlightened among internet companies.  Only Google had the courage to stand up to the totalitarian Chinese regime.  

Founded in 1889, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) is the world's leading business publication. Boasting more than two million subscribers, the Journal is the largest newspaper by total paid circulation and has the largest individually paid circulation of the top 25 U.S. newspapers. The Wall Street Journal franchise has a global audience of 3.8 million.

In Jan, 2010, the Wall Street Journal interviewed Techgoss about its views on the Indian Government ban on cartoon porn character Savita Bhabhi.  The same Wall Street Journal article also interviewed Minister of State for Communications and Technology Sachin Pilot.  The highly regarded Sachin Pilot told WSJ: “Only about 20 web sites have been shut down in India over the last decade.  We don’t want to be in the business of banning websites”.

While Minister Pilot was claiming that there is minimum censorship in India, no one is sure about the hard facts.  No one keeps track of which Government Department or Court asked for a site to be banned or for content to be removed.  Sometimes, two different Government Departments may be lobbying for two different outcomes on a censorship issue.  If an individual or organization is censored, they rarely go to court as their case may not be heard for years. 

While India is truly a democratic country, many rich and powerful still believe they can get away with any crime.

No one was sure how many times the Indian Government asked Google, Yahoo and other internet companies to censor material last year. 

Now Google itself has released the figures.  Google has published figures which show that the Indian Government asked them to remove content 142 times in 2009.  These figures also show that the Indian Government has asked Google 1061 times about the background of people using Google services like Gmail, Blogger and YouTube.

Looking at the Google figures, India has miles to go before it can claim to have a relatively free internet.  By contrast, the Pakistani Government seems to be less bothered about what its citizens do on the internet.

Google has to be commended for releasing the figures for 2009.  Now it is for Yahoo India to do the same.