India tops the list of Internet shutdowns in the world among a groups of 21 countries that curbed citizens’ web access in 2020, Hindustan Times reported.
The report further said that China and North Korea was exempted from the report because researchers relied on publicly available open source information and have documented internet and social media shutdowns.
India restricted Internet for 8,927 hours in the year 2020.
Internet restrictions in Kashmir — where the government in 2019 revoked the special autonomous status of the country’s only Muslim majority state – affected access for medicines, businesses, education and schools.
The partial internet ban still remains in place in of Jammu Kashmir with frequent closure of internet in view of encounters, which are almost an everyday affair.
At 27,165 hours, major internet disruptions recorded worldwide in 2020 were higher by 49% compared to the previous year and affected 268 million people, according to the report.
The report further revealed that about 42% of the shutdowns were associated with additional human rights abuses.