Delhi High Court questions government on regulating addictive social media features
The Delhi High Court asked India's government whether it planned to regulate addictive design features on social media platforms such as infinite scroll and autoplay. The court heard a public interest petition seeking an expert committee to examine engagement-maximising features, citing data that Indian youth aged 18-24 spend over 120 minutes daily on social media.
What happened
On 16 September 2026, the Delhi High Court bench of Justice Nitin Wasudeo Sambre and Justice Amit Sharma asked the Government of India's Additional Solicitor General Chetan Sharma to respond on whether the Centre was contemplating formulating a policy to regulate addiction-causing design features on social media platforms.
The court heard a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by law professor Vikas Kathuria seeking constitution of an expert committee to examine engagement-maximising and addiction-causing design features on social media platforms such as infinite scroll, autoplay, algorithmically curated and personalised feeds, notification systems, and variable-reward engagement metrics like 'likes'.
Reported impact
The plea noted that Indian youths aged 18-24 spend more than an average of 120 minutes daily on social media, giving significance to concerns about addiction-causing design features.
Index analysis
The counsel for the Centre and certain social media platforms objected to the maintainability of the petition in view of orders from the Supreme Court and high courts which had refused to entertain similar petitions.
The Additional Solicitor General suggested that the issues raised could be submitted as a representation to the government as they would be in the domain of policymakers.
Governance controls
The court scheduled the next hearing of the PIL after three weeks.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.