Lucknow: With senior bureaucrats and others using social media to make a style statement or out of self-obsession , the state government has issued fresh guidelines and tweaked rules for use of media platforms, declaring that a repost or retweet against principles of good governance will be considered endorsement.
As social media is influencing the lives of people empowering even ordinary users, amid concerns about lack of accountability and effective mechanism to check the use, the state government has issued two sets of separate directives with the latest issued on June 28 by Uttar Pradesh chief secretary saying “Any comment/post, repost, retweet, which is illegal, immoral, undignified, obscene or against the principles of good governance, should not be shared on social media. Such a post from the government personnel will be considered endorsement.”
“In order to uphold the dignity and decorum of their post, the government personnel should not behave in public or through the media in a manner that projects them as special or self-obsessed person,” read the state government’s directives further.
There have been instances of use of social media for purposes that raised eyebrows of the authorities and invited action, though on many occasions certain comments/posts went unnoticed. A post on Instagram by an IAS officer in 2022 attracted attention of even the Election Commission of India that removed the officer for flaunting his posting in Gujarat for poll duty.
{{/usCountry}}There have been instances of use of social media for purposes that raised eyebrows of the authorities and invited action, though on many occasions certain comments/posts went unnoticed. A post on Instagram by an IAS officer in 2022 attracted attention of even the Election Commission of India that removed the officer for flaunting his posting in Gujarat for poll duty.
{{/usCountry}}About the use of various social media platforms, the state government’s directives said the officers/employees should take all the precautions and use private accounts only in special circumstances and not highlight personal achievements in both official and personal accounts. “...social media is a sensitive platform. Any post, video, photograph, facts or knowledge shared/uploaded on social media platform can lead to any type of reaction or it can be misused in any form. It is, therefore, necessary to take all precautions and seek approval from an appropriate level before uploading the information... The government account should be used to share departmental information on social media. The private account should only be used in special circumstances. In both types of accounts, priority should be given to government publicity and not personal achievements...”
The state government has set guidelines for interactions by the officers at press briefing/press conferences and stressed upon the need of knowing about the cyber laws and take legal action in case of misuse of social media account. “All the government employees should know about cyber laws. All precautions should be taken to check misuse of social media and in case of misuse legal action should be taken immediately.”
Earlier on June 19, dditional chief secretary, personnel department, Devesh Chaturvedi issued a separate order tweaking the Uttar Pradesh Government Employees Conduct Rules 1956 incorporating electronic media, social media and digital media at places therein where a reference about newspapers and radio broadcast wass made. It asked government employees to not make a statement or write in newspapers him/herself or anonymously that criticised any decision of senior officers or the state government or the competent authority’s policy/work. It also asked them to not make any statement that may cause any embarrassment to the Uttar Pradesh government, union government or any other state government.