Maharashtra on Thursday issued an advisory for WhatsApp users and admins to contain the growing cases of rumours and fake news amidst fast-spreading cases of coronavirus.

The forwarding and spreading of "false and mischievious news" will attract punitive action, as per an advisory issued by the Office of the Special Inspector General of Police, Maharashtra Cyber unit.

The advisory directs users and admins to ensure that objectionable posts are deleted, particularly fake news, hate speech or misinformation. Users are also required to check the source and verify news, videos, images and memes before posting them on a group, as per the advisory.

It encourages users to report fake news, hate speech and misinformation to the nearest police station.

Group admins have more responsibility under the new advisory for monitoring content and sharing the rules of posting information. They are expected to inform authorities if mischievous or objectionable content is shared on the group.

Here is the link to read Maharashtra government's full advisory

The Maharashtra government's advisory comes weeks after the Indian government wrote to top social media companies including Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, ShareChat and Twitter, to help control the spread of misinformation on COVID-19.

Among social media platforms, India is the biggest market for the Facebook-owned instant messaging application, WhatsApp with more than 400 million users in the country.

India is also a major market for Google's YouTube with more than 265 million monthly active users.