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Comment by tomrod | Hacker News Reader

> As a sovereign state, India obviously has the right to ban the Wikimedia Foundation, or any other foreign entity, from doing business within the county

I fundamentally disagree. The Indian State exists to serve its citizens, which are benefitted unambiguous by a free and unconstrained source like Wikipedia. The sovereignty of any state is subject to the benefit of its citizens, not the other way around.

That doesn't mean they won't try anyway, but let us not confuse what is technically or politically feasible with what is moral.

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That's something only Indian citizens and people living in India can decide. Outsiders may have opinions, but they cannot override the will of the people who have a legitimate standing in the matters of the state.

And note how I included "people living in India" here. Legitimacy is a fuzzy concept. Citizenship is a legal category, and it should not matter for legitimacy as such. But it is widely accepted that citizens living outside their country still have a legitimate standing in the matters of the country. But beyond that, a legitimate government should serve the interests of the people factually living within the country. India does not have a large non-citizen population, and the distinction is mostly irrelevant with them. But some other countries do. If their governments only serve the interests of their citizens, they are fundamentally illegitimate.

Indian state can do what it feels correct. If Indian citizens disagree, then they can use the judicial system to compel the court to revert the decision in greater national interest (maybe ban that specific page being accessed from India). All, people, govt, ANI, Wikipedia, the editors of the page should feel that injustice is not being done to them.

> they can use the judicial system to compel the court to revert the decision in greater national interest

I'm skeptical that a government already exercising authoritarianism would give ear to the will of the people.

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