‘Ban doesn’t punish paper leak culprits’: Telegram CEO Pavel Durov criticises Centre’s move ahead of NEET-UG re-exam
When the Centre decided to restrict access to messaging app Telegram ahead of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test Undergraduate (NEET-UG) 2026 re-examination, the stated goal was clear: disrupt paper leak rackets operating on the platform.Telegram founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Pavel Durov says the move is hitting the wrong people.Responding to the Indian government’s decision, Durov posted on X that the week-long restriction punishes ordinary users rather than those responsible for leaking examination material.“India’s IT ministry banned Telegram for one week because some users shared leaked exam questions. This punishes 150M+ ordinary Telegram users in India, not the insiders who leaked the exam materials,” he wrote.He also questioned the effectiveness of the measure, adding: “The ban hasn’t stopped anything. The leaks just moved to other apps.”
Why Telegram was restricted
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology directed that access to Telegram be restricted across India until June 22. The order covers the June 21 NEET-UG re-examination and the immediate period after it.A separate direction requires Telegram to disable its message-editing feature in India until June 30.According to the National Testing Agency (NTA), the feature had allegedly been misused by fraud networks to insert question papers into old messages and present them as evidence of a leak.The agency described the restrictions as temporary and said they were intended to protect candidates from scams promising access to examination papers.
Crackdown on paper leak claims
The action follows investigations into Telegram channels that allegedly claimed to possess the NEET question paper and demanded money from candidates and their families.The NTA has repeatedly maintained that no examination paper exists outside its secured chain of custody and has described such offers as fraudulent.More than 22 lakh candidates are expected to take the NEET-UG re-examination on June 21 after the May 3 test was cancelled following paper leak allegations.The controversy now extends beyond examination security. It has become a question of whether restricting an entire platform is the most effective way to stop those attempting to exploit students during one of India’s largest entrance examinations.
