The Union government restricted access to messaging application Telegram till June 22, a day after the scheduled re-examination of the 2026 undergraduate National Eligibility cum Entrance Test for seats in medical colleges. The Centre also directed the platform to disable its message-editing feature till June 30.

The National Testing Agency claimed that the application’s message-editing feature was used in several recent examinations to make fabricated claims of paper leaks. Read on.

Social media and streaming platforms host and profit from Hindutva “hate music” that dehumanises Muslims and Christians and incites violence against them, according to a new study. The Center for the Study of Organized Hate identified 523 Hindutva hate songs on platforms such as YouTube, Meta, Apple Music and Spotify platforms that violated content policies.

More than 50% of the 523 songs directly threatened or incited violence against religious minorities, while the rest promoted or incited hatred through slurs and dehumanisation, according to the study by the Washington DC-based non-profit think tank.

When 225 songs were reported to the four platforms in October for content policy violations, only 18 had been removed by May, a takedown rate of 8%, it added. Read on.

A cut-throat digital economy and deep-rooted hatred have fundamentally changed India, Nachiket Joshi reviews the book ‘H-Pop’

The delay in the onset of southwest monsoon in most parts of the country has led to concerns about shortage of rainfall, water scarcity and continued high temperatures. Data from the India Meteorological Department showed that the monsoon had reached southern Maharashtra in the west, parts of Odisha in the south-east and regions of West Bengal and Bihar in the east.

The advance line of the monsoon was at least four days behind the usual date of onset in Mumbai, southern Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. India had received only 19.2 mm of rainfall between June 4 and June 15, against a normal of 53.7 mm. This is a rainfall deficit of 64.2%. Read on.

The Union government amended the 1945 Drugs Rules to ban the over-the-counter sale of all syrups, including those consumed to treat cough. The purchase of syrups will require a doctor’s prescription. Pills, tablets and lozenges for cough would continue to be available without a prescription.

The rules have been amended following a series of cases of contaminated cough syrups leading to deaths of children. Read on.

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