If the government wants to make digital platforms safe then it should ask Twitter to suspend those abusive Twitter accounts and abusive Twitter trends which target minorities, especially Indian Muslims and Prime Minister Modi should unfollow abusive trolls.
Md Asif Khan, TwoCircles.net
“Your account has been withheld in India in response to a legal demand,” I saw this message when I opened my Twitter app at 2:15 p.m. on February 1, 2021. I was surprised to see this because I knew that I have never tweeted anything which violates any India Law. After a few minutes, I came to know that besides mine, many other Twitter users’ accounts had been withheld in India.
The withheld Twitter accounts belonged to politicians, actors, activists and the official account of farmers’ unions. All those accounts, including mine, were tweeting in favour of the ongoing farmers’ protests in India. No one knew the reason why our accounts had been blocked or withheld.
Later on, the government of India clarified that 250 tweets/Twitter accounts have been blocked because they used the hashtag #ModiPlanningFarmerGenocide in their tweets. Although most of us got our account back within 6 hours, the Modi government threatened Twitter employees with jail time unless they block us again.
Few days after this, the government sent a fresh list of nearly 1200 accounts to Twitter, asking it to either suspend or block them in India. According to the government, those accounts “were flagged by security agencies as accounts of Khalistan sympathizers or backed by Pakistan”.
On February 2, well-known international celebrity Rihanna and environmental activist Greta Thunberg tweeted a news article related to farmers’ protest, and it created havoc in the right-wing ecosystem in India. The next day, the government, India Media, Bollywood celebs and cricketers started defending the government and ran a pro-government campaign on Twitter. The Modi government was on backfoot due to the criticism it received in the international community, and following this, they then decided to control the narrative on digital platforms.
This was the beginning of digital censorship.
On February 25, the Modi government notified Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021. These rules were framed because the Modi govt wanted to ‘Neutralize’ independent news. According to a report in The Caravan, a group of ministers (GoM) in mid-2020 set out a roadmap to “neutralize” the independent news media as it “generates a lot of heat”. The GoM wanted to make a strategy “to neutralize the people who are writing against the government without facts and set false narratives /spread fake news.” According to The Caravan, it was suggested to GoM that journalists should be “colour-coded” as per their closeness to the government, e.g. Green — fence-sitters; Black — against; and White — who support.
Minister Smriti Irani suggested putting together a list of ‘50 negative influencers’ and tracking them constantly, and engaging regularly with “50 positive influencers”.
This meant that the government will dictate OTT platforms and digital content and they can ban any content and take legal action against any social media users if the government found the content “anti-national.”
The government claims that new rules are self-regulatory and for digital safety but their claim is far from the truth. The Modi government doesn’t care about digital safety, because Modi himself follows many abusive trolls, serial abusers, sexist bigots, rumour mongers on Twitter. Supporters of Modi and BJP often spread fake news and anti-Muslim hate campaign on Twitter but the government never takes any action against them.
For instance, the government never asked Twitter to ban those accounts that spread hatred and fake news. But the fact is that several BJP ministers promote and support fake news peddlers by following them. In the past, BJP supporters ran many hateful hashtags on the internet to target Muslims. In these posts they would abuse the Prophet of Islam (PBUH), abuse Muslim women, however, the Modi government never took action against these trolls.
Some of the examples of those hateful Twitter trends run by Right Wing trollss are #पैगंबर_बलात्कारी_है (Prophet is rapist), #पैगंबर_आतंकी_है (Prophet is terrorist), #मुस्लिमो_का_संपूर्ण_बहिष्कार (Total boycott of Muslims),#मुसलमान_भारत_छोड़ो (Muslims leave India), #yourprophetisgay #yourprophetisrapist #पै_GAY_म्बर , #BoycottAllah and #बिकाऊऔरते_शहीनबागकी (Calling Muslim women protesters paid).
If the government wants to make digital platforms safe then it should ask Twitter to suspend those abusive Twitter accounts and abusive Twitter trends which target minorities, especially Indian Muslims and Prime Minister Modi should unfollow abusive trolls.
Md Asif Khan is a social activist. He tweets at @imMAK02