Hackers attacked and defaced the website of India's IT minister on Friday amid a growing campaign against a law governing online comments which has been condemned by free-speech advocates. An amendment to India's Information Technology Act in 2009, which was championed by minister Kapil Sibal, makes it illegal to make "grossly offensive" comments online, a measure seen by critics as a draconian limit on free speech.

Two girls were arrested earlier this month by police in the commercial capital Mumbai over comments on Facebook which questioned the shutdown of the city for the funeral of local hard-line politician Bal Thackeray. The personal website of Sibal, who has promised to review some sections of the law, was out of order on Friday and the hackers, thought to be from the Anonymous India collective, also defaced the site. The "About" section of the website described Sibal as "Born with a below-60 IQ he thought he could mess with the Internet and let the elite of his party suppress freedom of speech," India's Computer World magazine reported.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2012