IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw confirmed that neither WhatsApp nor its parent company Meta has notified the government of any plans to discontinue their services in India. This statement was made in response to a question raised in the Rajya Sabha recently.

“The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has shared that WhatsApp or Meta has not informed the government about any such plans,” Vaishnaw stated in a written reply to a question by Congress member Vivek Tankha, according to a PTI report on July 26.

Tankha inquired if WhatsApp was considering shutting down its services in India due to government directives to share user details under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Responding to Tankha’s question about restrictions on social media platforms, the I&B minister explained that the central government issues directions in the interest of sovereignty, integrity, defense, security, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, or preventing incitement to commit any cognizable offense, Times of India reported.

Earlier this year, WhatsApp informed the Delhi High Court that it would cease operations in India if compelled by the government to break the encryption of messages. WhatsApp had previously challenged the newly amended IT Rules, arguing that they violated the right to privacy and were unconstitutional. The platform emphasized that its end-to-end encryption ensures only the sender and recipient can access message content.

“As a platform, we are saying, if we are told to break encryption, then WhatsApp goes,” Tejas Karia, representing WhatsApp, told a Division Bench. He added that users rely on WhatsApp for its privacy features.

WhatsApp has over 400 million users in India, making it the platform’s largest market.