On April 20, 2023, The Wire published an article based on a Right to Information (RTI) application filed by the Internet Freedom Foundation, which asked eight questions, relating mainly to the composition of the Press Information Bureau’s (PIB) fact-check unit, as well the numbers of cases of fact-checking that were reported to the PIB, acted upon by the PIB and “busted” by the PIB.
In response to this RTI application, the PIB responded that it has received 1,18,948 queries since April 02, 2020, and the “number of total Fact Checks done is 1,223”. Of these, the PIB claimed, the “number of total Fake News Busted is 1189.”
On the basis of this signed RTI response from the joint director of the Press Information Bureau, The Wire published an article reporting the same number as provided by the PIB under the Right to Information Act, 2005.
Also read: Out of Nearly 1.2 Lakh Queries in 3 Years, PIB’s Fact-Check Unit Acted on 1,223
The PIB has subsequently posted a “fact check” of this article via its Twitter account, putting forth five points in response to why The Wire’s article is “misleading”.
There were five points made by PIB. Our responses are as below:
1. A total of 1,19,572 queries have been received.
This appears to be an updated number. In its RTI response, the PIB stated that “the unit has received a total of 1,18,948 queries since April 02, 2020”. A rough estimate of 1.2 lakhs was shared in the article.
2. The above total comprises 80,236 queries which were deemed not relevant, and 39,336 queries which were deemed actionable.
This information was not provided in PIB’s RTI response. Nevertheless, the article accounted for a lower number of queries being actionable, as a way to explain why the PIB has self-admittedly only done 1,223 fact checks. In fact, our article relied on data provided in a recent parliamentary response by the Union minister of information and broadcasting, in which he stated that the actionable queries received were 37,000.
Our article further relied on a subsequent parliamentary response by the minister of state for electronics and information technology which reiterated the number of actionable queries at 37,000.
3. All the actionable queries were acted upon via direct reply to individuals often with information useful for the individual concerned.
This claim does not fact-check anything that is stated in our original article, since it makes no claim about whether the PIB acted on ‘actionable queries’. PIB’s RTI response on which the original article primarily relies made no mention of how the PIB acts upon actionable queries. Rather, the article proactively introduces ‘actional queries’ by relying on additional sources of information.
4. Moreover, 1,225 fact checks were posted on the Fact-Check social media platforms of PIB. These were found suitable for public posting and are considered by PIB as fact-checks.
The 1,225 also seems to be updated data. In its response to the RTI application, the PIB stated that it has done 1,223 fact checks, as of April 16, 2023. It would appear that it has done two more fact-checks since then. Perhaps, including one to our own article.
In its RTI response, provided under the Right to Information Act, 2005, the PIB has claimed that “the number of total Fact Checks done is 1223”. It has neither clarified what it considers as “doing a fact check” nor that its view is that posting on social media is what constituted “doing a fact check”.
5. The article wrongly describes these fact-check posts as the number of queries acted upon. This is misleading. A single fact-check post could result from an assessment of multiple actionable queries as well as information from other sources, including suo-moto cognisance by PIB.
Our article itself accounts for the duplication of queries, and also refers to the PIB’s powers of taking suo motu cognisance in the third and second paragraph respectively. Our article describes the fact checks done as queries acted upon for the simple reason that this was conveyed by the PIB in its response provided under the statutory framework of the Right to Information Act, 2005, i.e. its statement in the RTI response that “number of total Fact Checks done is 1,223.” As above, the PIB has neither clarified what it considers as “doing a fact check” nor that its view is that posting on social media is what constituted “doing a fact check”.
Tanmay Singh is the Senior Litigation Counsel and Tejasi Panjiar is an Associate Policy Counsel at the Internet Freedom Foundation.
The Wire’s editor adds:
The claim made by the PIB fact-check unit that the article published by The Wire is “misleading” does not stand up to scrutiny. The PIB FCU’s latest “fact-check” which wrongly classified The Wire’s article as “misleading” makes it clear that the recently amended IT Rules – which seek to compel social media intermediaries to take down “fake” or “misleading” news – are an attack on freedom of the press.