Apple and Google have removed Telegram from their app stores in India after the government ordered the app blocked in the country until June 22. The move is tied to exam-security fears, with India’s NEET-UG medical entrance exams scheduled for June 21, and authorities appear to be treating Telegram less like a messaging app and more like a leakage machine.
That is a blunt response to a messy problem. Indian regulators say some Telegram channels were selling exam papers for thousands of rupees, while officials also want Telegram’s message-editing feature disabled until June 30 because it was allegedly used to fake evidence of leaks after exams had already ended.
What India ordered Telegram to do
According to reports cited by local and international outlets, the order goes beyond app-store removal. Telegram has also been told to switch off message editing in India, and major telecom operators including Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone have already started blocking access.
- App-store removal in India: until June 22
- Message editing disabled in India: until June 30
- NEET-UG exam date: June 21
Why Telegram became the target
The government’s case is rooted in exam fraud, not general cybersecurity. The allegation is that bad actors used Telegram channels to trade leaked papers, then used editable messages to make old posts look like fresh evidence once the exams were over. That is a narrow abuse case, but the remedy is sweeping enough to hit millions of ordinary users who were not buying, selling, or forging anything.
That tension is familiar in platform regulation: when a tool is useful to scammers, governments often reach for the biggest hammer available. The difference here is that Telegram is not a tiny fringe app; it is a major communications platform in India, and a block like this instantly spills into carrier networks, app stores, and legal disputes.
Pavel Durov pushes back over the India block
Telegram founder Pavel Durov said the order punishes around 150 million regular users in India rather than the insiders responsible for the leaks. He also accused Reliance of interfering with Telegram access outside India, including in the United Arab Emirates, through BGP hijacking, and later said that routing issue stopped four hours after he posted about it.
He has also taken the dispute to a local court. That is the obvious next arena: not a technical argument about channel moderation, but a legal fight over whether a platform-wide shutdown is proportional to the threat. If the court narrows the order, other governments watching this case may think twice before using exam fraud as a justification for broad app bans.