New Delhi: Several Twitter accounts, including those of ‘The Caravan’ and ‘Kisan Ekta Morcha’ (the official page for the farmers’ agitation), were on Monday withheld in India in response to a legal demand” amid the farmers’ protest and FIRs against journalists, thequint reported.
The Ministry of Electronics and IT (MEITY) has directed Twitter to block around 250 tweets and Twitter accounts, which were using offensive, inciting hashtags, which have been making fake, intimidatory and provocative tweets, Hindustan Times (HT) reported.
According to reports, this was done at the request of the Union Home Ministry, which has also reimposed Internet restrictions on border areas to prevent any escalation of the law and order situation.
“Incitement to genocide is a grave threat to public order and therefore the Ministry of Electronics and IT ordered for blocking of these Twitter accounts & Tweets under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act. Twitter has blocked these Tweets/Twitter Accounts,” news agency ANI reported quoting sources.
The order from the Centre came on January 30 amid tense situation on the border where farmers have been protesting since November.
However, their Facebook accounts are still active. Vinod Jose, editor-in-chief of The Caravan was quoted as saying that they were not aware of any communication from Twitter and will be writing to the social media platform for further clarity.
“In our effort to make our services available to people everywhere, if we receive a properly scoped request from authorized entity, it may be necessary to withhold access to certain content in particular country. Transparency is vital to protecting freedom of expression, so we’ve a notice policy for withheld content. Upon receipt of requests to withhold content, we will promptly notify the affected account holders (unless we are prohibited from doing so eg if we receive a court order under seal),” Twitter was quoted as saying.
According to Twitter’s rules, an account can only be withheld based on a valid legal demand such as a court order. At this time, it is unclear which court in India has issued such an order, the report added.
