Pavel Durov has claimed that the platform has removed “hundreds of channels” over the past few weeks for allegedly sharing leaked examination materials and running related scams in India.
Image: IANS
The temporary suspension of Telegram in India ahead of the NEET-UG re-examination has affected more than 150 million users, the messaging platform’s founder and CEO Pavel Durov said.
“India’s IT ministry banned Telegram for one week because some users shared leaked exam questions. This punishes 150M+ ordinary Telegram users in India — not the insiders who leaked the exam materials. And the ban hasn’t stopped anything. The leaks just moved to other apps,” Durov wrote on X.
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He further claimed that the platform has removed “hundreds of channels” over the past few weeks for allegedly sharing leaked examination materials and running related scams in India.
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“We’re also making the “edited” label more visible to prevent backdating scams. Telegram is a force for good. Banning it — even temporarily — is a mistake,” he added.
India’s IT ministry banned Telegram for one week because some users shared leaked exam questions.
This punishes 150M+ ordinary Telegram users in India — not the insiders who leaked the exam materials.
And the ban hasn’t stopped anything. The leaks just moved to other apps. https://t.co/CzQWN4mXfb
— Pavel Durov (@durov) June 16, 2026
His comments came after the Indian government ordered a temporary suspension of Telegram services across the country until June 22 as part of key measures aimed at preventing malpractice during the NEET-UG 2026 re-examination scheduled for June 21.
The crucial exam is being conducted again after allegations of question paper leaks during the original test held on May 3.
The temporary ban was imposed following recommendations from the National Testing Agency (NTA) that conducts NEET for admissions to undergraduate medical colleges across the country.
Apart from the temporary suspension, Telegram has further been directed to disable its message-editing feature in India until June 30.
In a statement, NTA mentioned that investigators believe the feature was previously misused to create misleading evidence of question paper leaks through editing messages after examination papers had already been circulated.
In compliance with the central government’s directive, Google and Apple have already removed Telegram from their app stores.
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