The Catch Up: 21 March

This is the Catch Up on 3 Things for the Indian Express and I'm Flora Swain.
It’s the 21st of March and here are today's headlines.

The Supreme Court today stayed the operation of the Centre’s March 20 notification regarding the Press Information Bureau’s Fact Checking Unit (FCU). The stay will be in effect until the Bombay High Court takes a final decision on petitions challenging the 2023 amendments to the Information Technology Rules. A three-judge bench noted that the Centre had assured the HC that the FCU will not be notified till the petitions challenging Rule 3(1)(b)(v) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules 2023 (IT Amendment Rules, 2023 are decided by the HC.

In other news from the apex court, the SC today dismissed applications challenging the appointment of retired IAS officers Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu as election commissioners. The bench also declined to stay The Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners (Appointment Conditions of Service and Terms of Office) Act, 2023 which put in place a selection committee comprising the Prime Minister, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, and a Union cabinet minister in place of a committee comprising the PM, Leader of Opposition and Chief Justice of India as directed by the Supreme Court.

The Election Commission today instructed the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology to immediately stop sending a letter by Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the account “Viksit Bharat Sampark” to WhatsApp users. In a letter to the MeitY Secretary, the EC asked the Ministry to submit a compliance report immediately. The EC told the Ministry that it had received “complaints from various quarters that such messages are still being delivered on citizens’ phones”.

The Congress today hit out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with veteran leader Sonia Gandhi saying that the PM was making “a systematic effort to cripple the Congress financially”. Addressing a press briefing, senior leaders Sonia and Rahul Gandhi and party president Mallikarjun Kharge spoke about the freezing of their bank accounts ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, saying that the issue was extremely serious with “far-reaching consequences for not just their party but for our country’s democracy.”

Two days after the gruesome murder of two minor brothers in Uttar Pradesh’s Budaun district, the police today arrested the second accused who had been allegedly absconding after the crime. Officers said Javed, the brother of accused Sajid, surrendered before the Bareilly police late on Wednesday after a reward of Rs. 25,000 was declared on him. Budaun SSP added five teams were formed to arrest Javed, who is around 25 years old.

This was the Catch-Up on the 3 Things by The Indian Express.