While the Internet and multimedia applications have made it easy to produce and
spread media, they have also made it possible to distribute fake news to masses.
With over 200 million active users in India and growing, WhatsApp’s reach and
features make it a top choice to spread fake news. This not only influences public
opinion in India but has also sometimes created panic and incited to violence.
This paper looks into how political propaganda is peddled through the WhatsApp
in the form of ‘news’ (fake news). It also explores what makes the WhatsApp such
a powerful application in Indian context, how do people use it and how existing
laws in India make it difficult to trace the origin of the fake news.