Grievance Appellate Committees will be set up within three months by the government for resolving social media users’ grievances. In this regard, a gazette notification was issued by the Ministry Of Electronics And Information Technology yesterday, October 28, to amend the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.
AIR correspondent reports, according to the notification, each Grievance Appellate Committee will consist of a chairperson and two whole time members appointed by the Central Government. The notification states that any person aggrieved by a decision of the Grievance Officer may prefer an appeal to the Grievance Appellate Committee within a period of thirty days from the date of receipt of communication from the Grievance Officer. It also states that the Grievance Appellate Committee will adopt an online dispute resolution mechanism.
Terming this a step towards empowering the users, Electronics & Information Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said, the focus is on the protection of online users. He said, Grievance Appellate Committee has been introduced for hearing appeals against decisions of the Grievance Officer appointed by the intermediary.
He said, privacy policy and user agreements of intermediary are to be made available in the Eighth Schedule Indian languages. Mr. Vaishnaw said, intermediary, will ensure the accessibility of its services to all users and respect their rights under the Constitution of India as the law of the land is supreme.
Comments are closed.