NEW DELHI, June 28: The controversy between Twitter and the government of India continues with Twitter carrying a wrong map of India, which shows Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh as a separate country. Twitter may face government action for carrying the wrong map
The map that appears on the “Tweep Life” section of Twitter shows Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, outside India. The distorted map was flagged by a Twitter user and has generated many angry reactions.
Sources say the government may take tough action.
This is the latest controversy in the ongoing stand-off between the government and Twitter over a range of issues from the tagging of BJP leaders’ posts as “manipulated media” to new rules for social media sites.
Twitter had flagged “freedom of expression” concerns while responding to the new rules, which include appointing India-based compliance officers.
As it was slow to respond to the government’s warnings on complying with the rules, there were questions about Twitter losing legal protection against user-generated content.
On May 31, Twitter told the Delhi High Court that it was appointing Dharmendra Chatur, partner at a law firm that represented Twitter as its interim grievance redressal officer. However, the government said it could not accept the appointment of outsiders to statutory posts.
But just a week after his appointment, Dharmendra Chatur resigned on Sunday. Twitter has now appointed its US-based Global Legal Policy Director Jeremy Kessel as the grievance officer for India. The new rules, however, require an Indian resident for the role.
In a series of run-ins with Twitter, the government had also asked the site to remove the “manipulated media” tag from tweets posted by several BJP leaders on an alleged Congress “toolkit”.
As Twitter refused to do so, the Delhi Police also served notices, visited its offices in Delhi and Gurgaon, and questioned Twitter India chief Manish Maheshwari in Bengaluru.
On Friday, Union IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad’s Twitter account was briefly locked, allegedly over copyright violations. The minister said he was denied access to his account for over an hour over complaints that he violated copyright law by posting clips of himself from television debates.
It followed the Parliamentary standing committee headed by the Congress MP Shashi Tharoor asking Twitter to follow the law of the land and abide by the Intermediary guidelines framed by the government. Following the warning, Tharoor’s account too was blocked for a brief period, Tharoor said.
(Manas Dasgupta)
