India cuts timeline to remove unlawful AI content from 36 to 3 hours. What are the new rules?

India is taking stronger measures to tackle AI-generated deepfakes, including fake audio, video and text. In a significant move, the India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has reduced the timeline for platforms to remove unlawful content from 36 hours to just 3 hours. According to the new rule any such content that is brought to the notice of social media platforms either by the government or the through the notice of a court has to be pulled down within 3 hours and in some sensitive cases within 2 hours.

Bringing deepfakes directly within the country's digital regulation framework and labelling AI content has been made mandatory by MeitY.

While there are rules to check deepfake crimes, the move has made it compulsory for platforms to ensure clear labelling and traceable metadata for AI content so that people can identify synthetic content.

ALSO READ: PM Modi’s foreign trips cost nearly ₹75 crore so far in 2026, parliamentary data shows

Also the government has made it mandatory for platforms to address complaints within 36 hours, down from 72 hours earlier.

For sensitive content like nudity, impersonation and related offence, the action timeline has been reduced from 24 hours to 2 hours.

According to MeitY large social media platforms with over 50 lakh users must use automated detection tools to catch unlawful content. The will also have to publish compliance reports, appoint grievance officers, support law-enforcement agencies and enable user verification and appeal systems.

Meta Apologises

This comes amid Meta apologising for a video message by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Facebook being taken down for five hours.

The apology was tendered by Meta's chief global officer Joel Kaplan to Union minister for electronics and IT Ashwini Vaishnaw.

“I apologised to the minister on behalf of Meta for error restricting PM Modi’s post,” a statement from Meta cited Kaplan as saying.