‘Not surprising’: BJP vs Congress Twitter war over Jack Dorsey's ‘sensational’ claims
BJP IT-cell head Amit Malviya slammed Jack Dorsey, while the Congress sought the government's answer.
Jack Dorsey's claims that the Indian government put pressure on Twitter to block accounts covering the farmers' protests has snowballed into a massive political slugfest, with the Bharatiya Janata Party hitting out at the former CEO of the microblogging site, while the Congress describing it a “sensational disclosure”.
BJP IT-cell head Amit Malviya, in a long post on Twitter, slammed Dorsey saying his allegations were not surprising “because under Dorsey, Twitter had turned rouge, disregarding laws of the sovereigns they operated in, muzzling freedom of speech (shadow banning ideologically differing voices) and in many cases promoting secessionist voices and those who were working to exacerbate social fault lines, including several Twitter employees (Dorsey himself is guilty of it)”.
Malviya also claimed that several ‘Twitter Files’, released after Elon Musk got rid of the “toxic people in Twitter”, is a testimony.
Also Read: On Jack Dorsey's ‘pressure from India’ claim, ex-IT minister Sibal says BJP govt has ‘every reason to lie’
“But why is the Congress and assorted Opposition excited by an invertebrate liars misplaced assertions? What is their compulsion to latch on to anyone who speaks against India? Rahul Gandhi goes abroad and seeks help of foreign powers and his minions in India amplify stray disposed voices to demonise India… Is leaning on foreign money and media the only way Congress hopes to undermine the will of the people and unseat a democratically elected Govt?” Malviya asked.
BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla took a dig at the Congress and said “Janeudhari Rahul’s party find validation in Jack Dorsey who wanted to ‘smash Brahmanical patriarchy’”.
“Just a few days after Kirby, USA shut down the fake ‘democracy is dead’ narrative. When World Bank, IMF, Morgan Stanley give thumbs up to Indian Economy, Janeudhari Rahul’s party Congress find validation in Jack Dorsey who wanted to ‘smash Brahmanical patriarchy’. Last time when Doklam was happening Rahul was spotted with the Chinese. Then Rahul wanted foreign intervention in UK. Now Rahul has been in USA on an agenda. Sanyog ya prayog? U decide !! Guess desh ki janta se haare to Rahul Baba videshi ke share,” the BJP leader tweeted.
‘Will shut Twitter down… raid homes’: Jack Dorsey
In an interview with YouTube channel 'Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar', on Monday, Dorsey who stepped down from Twitter's board last year, alleged that the Indian government had put pressure on Twitter and said that it will shut down the company in India and raid the houses of its employees.
".....India is one of the countries which had many requests around farmers protests, around particular journalists which were critical of the government and it manifested in ways such as we will shut Twitter down in India, India is a big marketplace for us. We would raid the homes of your employees, which they did and we will shut down your offices if you don't follow suit and this is India, a democratic country, " Dorsey said.
Earlier, the Congress sought an answer from the Centre Dorsey's claim.
“Modi Govt. forced twitter to shut down accounts of Farmers & Farmer’s movement, shut down accounts of journalists critical of Govt, OR Twitter and its employees would be raided. This is what Twitter Co Founder and Ex CEO Jack Dorsey admits in a TV interview. Will Modi Govt answer?” Congress MP Randeep Singh Surjewala tweeted.
“Sensational disclosure of former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. 'Indian government threatens to ban Twitter and raid during the farmer's movement'. The real face of the cowardly dictator and oppressive government will be exposed,” Congress's chairperson of social media and digital platforms Supriya Shrinate tweeted.
At a Congress press conference over the issues, Shrinate said, “The topic of this press conference is to reveal how the murder of democracy is being done in the mother of democracy...When farmers were agitating at the Delhi border for more than a year, braving winter, summer and rain, they were being called 'mawali, Khalistani, Pakistani and terrorists' and platforms like Twitter were being told that if they show farmers, they will be shut down in India and raided…”
Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Priyanka Chaturvedi also reacted to the interview alleging that “the BJP and the government tried to crush the farmers protest”.
“They tried to defame the movement, They called farmers terrorists, They called farmers anti national They lathicharged the farmers They let farmers die, They tried to silence the opposition in parliament, They tried to arm twist social media platforms to mute the voices of those supporting the farmers … but despite their might, despite their power, the farmers humbled their arrogance and forced the government to withdraw the farmers act. Indian democracy or rule of Modiocracy?” Chaturvedi tweeted.
‘An outright lie’: Rajeev Chandrasekhar
Meanwhile, the Centre rejected Dorsey's claims terming it as an "an outright lie" and "an attempt to brush out the very dubious period" of the social media company's history.
Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar said Twitter under Dorsey and his team were “in repeated and continuous violations of Indian law and that they complied only after June 2022”. "No one went to jail nor was twitter shutdown," he said in a tweet.
"This is an outright lie by @jack- perhaps an attempt to brush out that very dubious period of twitters history. @twitter undr Dorsey n his team were in repeated n continuous violations of India law. As a matter of fact they were in non-compliance with the law repeatedly from 2020 to 2022 and it was only June 2022 when they finally complied. No one went to jail nor was twitter shutdown," he wrote.
He further said that Dorsey's 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," Chandrasekhar wrote.
Referring to the farmer's protest in January 2021, he said that since there was a lot of misinformation the government of India was obligated to remove such information from the platform because it had the potential to further inflame the situation based on fake news.
He added that no one was raided or sent to jail the focus was to ensure compliance with Indian laws.
In November 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the repeal of the three Central farm laws.
Farmers staged a protest in large numbers against the government's three farm laws since the Centre passed the laws in 2020.
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