The Central government has told the Delhi High Court that it blocked digital news platform 4PM’s YouTube channel because it spread conspiracy theories about the Pahalgam terror attack, Bar and Bench reported.

The platform had approached the court after its YouTube channel was blocked in March this year. Its editor, Sanjay Sharma, told The Wire that he had received no clear or detailed explanation for the blocking order. The YouTube channel was also blocked last year in India. In both orders, the government cited “national security or public order”. 

In an affidavit filed in court, the government said 4PM questioned whether India’s military response to the Pahalgam attack was genuine, repeated Pakistani propaganda, and stirred communal tensions, especially in sensitive areas such as Kashmir and Manipur. It said it seemed to be part of a digital lobbying effort to influence Indian decision-making.

According to the affidavit, the channel showed “a consistent degenerative editorial pattern peddling anti-India/anti-Indian armed forces/anti-Indian foreign policy sentiments across all subjects, time period and formats”.

“It is submitted that the videos hosted on the blocked channel attributed grave acts to the Union of India, such as compromising India’s strategic autonomy, taking sovereign stand qua its military position under foreign influence, having prior awareness of military action in West Asia, endangering Indians abroad and permitting India’s foreign policy to be shaped by communal considerations at the biggest of foreign states who are in an inter-se conflict,” the affidavit states, according to Bar and Bench.

The government filed its response after 4PM and its editor-in-chief Sanjay Sharma moved the High Court challenging the blocking of the YouTube channel.

The petitioners said the channel had more than 8.4 million subscribers and had been among the top-ranked channels for the last three years. They said YouTube blocked the channel and 26 of its videos in March 2026 after receiving a legal request from the government. They also claimed that neither Google nor the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology gave them any formal order or explanation for the blocking.

The matter will next be heard on Wednesday.

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