Supreme Court Seeks Centre's Reply on Plea for Age Limits on Children's Social Media Use

The Supreme Court has asked the Centre and the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) to respond to a public interest litigation seeking an enforceable national framework to protect children on social media, including age verification and limits on account use by minors. A bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi issued the notices on 16 October 2026, PTI reported.

The court tagged the plea with a pending petition and listed the matter for further hearing on 7 December. It has not ruled on any of the restrictions sought.

Who filed it and what it asks

The petition was filed by Emerald Heights International School in Indore and its director of academics, Siddharth Singh Girnar. Notices went to the Ministry of Women and Child Development, the Ministry of Law and Justice, and the NCPCR.

According to the reports, the petition asks the court to:

• declare that the authorities' failure to protect children from social media harms violates Articles 14, 15(3), 21 and 21A of the Constitution;
• direct mandatory age verification, age-appropriate access and verifiable parental consent;
• direct the Centre to prohibit social media use below a prescribed age and regulate use by older children, including limits on creating and keeping accounts on designated platforms; and
• require the Centre to frame, notify and enforce a dedicated regulatory framework.

The plea lists harms including grooming, sexual exploitation, cyberbullying, blackmail, impersonation, the circulation of private images, behavioural profiling and design that encourages compulsive use, along with effects on sleep, concentration, anxiety and body image. These are the petitioners' submissions, not findings of the court.

Why it matters

India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 already requires platforms to obtain verifiable parental consent before processing the personal data of anyone under 18, but there is no law setting a minimum age for social media accounts. The case lands as several countries move to restrict teenagers' access to social media, including Spain's plan for under-16s. In India, NITI Aayog's former chief executive Amitabh Kant has also backed age curbs.