Centre on Kack Dorsey's claims: Centre on Tuesday hit back at Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey who had claimed that India had threatened to shut down the social networking site. Jack Dorsey, who quit as Twitter CEO in 2021, had alleged of receiving 'many requests' from India to censor accounts critical of the government and those reporting on farmers' protests, as well as threats of shutting down the platform.
Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar on Tuesday in a strong rebuttal termed Dorsey's claims as an 'outright lie.' "What he has said is an outright lie. Twitter is a company that believed that it was not necessary for it to comply with Indian laws. Govt of India has been very clear from the beginning that all companies that operate in India have to comply with Indian laws," Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar said.
"Between 2020-2022, Twitter was violating Indian law multiple times. It started complying with the law only in 2022. During that entire period, nobody went to jail, and nobody was raided. Jack Dorsey knowing very well that Twitter did not comply with any law & didn't face any consequence, is today lying and making stories about raids & arrests," Chandrasekhar added.
Rajeev Chandrasekhar also said, "Twitter was misusing its power as a platform to selectively de-amplify & de-platform people both in India and abroad."
Earlier too the Union minister had rebuked the social media platform CEO and had said it 'perhaps it is an attempt to brush out that very dubious period of twitters history'
His very long Twitter post says, "Dorseys Twitter regime had a problem accepting the sovereignty of Indian law. It behaved as if the laws of India did not apply to it. India as a sovereign nation has the right to ensure that its laws are followed by all companies operating in India. During the protests in January 2021, there was a lot of misinformation and even reports of genocide which were definitely fake. GoI was obligated to remove misinformation from the platform because it had the potential to further inflame the situation based on fake news. Such was the level of partisan behaviour on Twitter under Jack regime, that they had a problem removing misinformation from the platform in India, when they did it themselves when similar events took place in the USA."
He further said, "To set the record straight, no one was raided or sent to jail. Our focus was only on ensuring the compliance of Indian laws. There is ample evidence now in public domain abt Jacks twitter's arbitrary, blatantly partisan n discriminatory conduct and misuse of its power on its platform during that period. Twitter under Dorsey was not just violating Indian law, but was partisan in how it was using "deamplify" n deplatforming of some arbitrarily in violation of Art 14,19 of our constitution and also assisting in weaponising of misinformation. Our govts policies remain clear for all Intermediaries operating in India - compliance with laws to ensure Internet is Safe&Trusted, Accountable."
