What restrictions were imposed by the vernacular press act on the Indian press? Explain.

(i) The vernacular press act provided the government with extensive rights to censor reports and editorials in the vernacular press.

(ii) The government kept regular -track of the ' vernacular newspapers published in different provinces.

(iii) When a report was judged as seditious, the newspaper was warned.

(iv) If the warning was ignored, the press was liable to be seized and the printing machinery could be could be confiscated. 

After the revolt of 1857, the attitude to freedom of the press was changed in British India. Vernacular papers became assertively nationalist. To control the vernacular papers, the ‘Vernacular Press Act’ was passed in 1878 under the Governor-Generalship and Viceroyalty of Lord Lytton. 

The act empowered the government to impose restrictions on the press in the following ways

(i) The Vernacular Press Act was mainly introduced in order to suppress the freedom of press in India.

(ii) This policy was also started in order to prevent all the criticism towards the british government and their policies.

(iii) This act was proposed by Lord Lytton who was the Viceroy of India back then.

(iv) Since this was modelled after the Irish press act therefore, the government a had all the rights to censor all the editorials and reports in the vernacular press.