New Delhi, August 12, 2021 (PPI-OT):The Indian National Congress on Thursday alleged that the party’s official Twitter account as well as that of a large number of its leaders and workers have been blocked by the microblogging site. This comes close on the heels of the blocking of party leader Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter account after he shared pictures of the family of the nine-year-old alleged rape and murder victim last week.
Congress social media department head Rohan Gupta said the party’s official Twitter account and around 5,000 accounts of its top leaders and workers have been blocked by Twitter. He alleged that Twitter is acting against Congress leaders under pressure from the government. “Twitter is clearly acting under government’s pressure, as it did not remove the same pictures shared by the Twitter accounts of National Commission for Scheduled Castes for a few days,” Gupta said.
The Twitter accounts of AICC (All India Congress Committee) general secretaries Randeep Surjewala, K C Venugopal, Ajay Maken, party’s whip in Lok Sabha Manickam Tagore, Assam in-charge and former Union minister Jitendra Singh and Mahila (Women) Congress president Sushmita Dev have also been locked, the party said.
The AICC secretary in-charge of party’s Communications Department, Pranav Jha, tweeted that the Congress registers its protest and promises to continue the fight for each and all being wronged, last night. His account was later blocked too at night. The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) took cognisance of Gandhi’s tweet and directed Twitter to act against the Congress leader’s account for violating the privacy of a minor victim, mandated by the laws of the land.
Meanwhile, a Twitter spokesperson on Thursday said that the accounts of several Congress leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, were blocked for posting an image that it said violated its rules and the action was to protect individuals’ privacy and safety. “We have taken proactive action on several hundred Tweets that posted an image that violated our Rules and may continue to do so in line with our range of enforcement options. Certain types of private information carry higher risks than others, and our aim is always to protect individuals’ privacy and safety,” the spokesperson said.
The US-based company said it was alerted by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) about specific content on the platform that allegedly revealed the identity of an alleged sexual assault victim’s (and a minor’s) parents. The said content was reviewed against Twitter’s rules and policies as well as the concerns expressed as a matter of Indian law.
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