Twitter Obeys Indian Gov't Censoring of COVID Criticism
Tweets, some from Indian lawmakers, withheld from public view in India in response to a notice by the central government to Twitter
India.
New Delhi made an emergency order to Twitter and Facebook to censor over 100 posts in the country. Twitter disclosed the government order on Lumen database, a Harvard University project. The microblogging network and Facebook complied with the request, and withheld those posts from users in India.1
Over 20 tweets, some from Indian lawmakers, were reportedly withheld from public view in India in response to a notice by the central government to the social media giant…The list of censored tweets includes several by parliamentarian Revanth Reddy from the opposition Congress party, West Bengal state minister Moloy Ghatak, and filmmakers Vinod Kapri and Avinash Das.
Many tweets denounced the Narendra Modi led-government for failing to bolster India's crumbling healthcare system.2
Revanth Reddy,Member of Parliament for Malkajgiri, Telangana, tweeted that India was having over 200,000 new cases of the virus per day, and that the healthcare system was collapsing, along with a picture of a mass cremation. This tweet was removed. 3
The Lumen database collects and analyzes legal complaints and requests for removal of online materials, helping Internet users to know their rights and understand the law. These data enable us to study the prevalence of legal threats and let Internet users see the source of content removals.
Singh, Manish. “India orders Twitter and Facebook to take down posts critical of its coronavirus handling.” TechCrunch April 24, 2021.
Twitter censors tweets critical of India's COVID response. DW. April 25, 2021.
Deep, Aroon. Twitter Takes Down Tweets From MP, MLA, Editor Criticising Handling Of Pandemic Upon Government Request. Medianama, April 24, 2021.
This is supposed to be the largest democracy in the world. There was a spate of right-wing parties in Europe taking over countries or regions, and a great alarm was raised because they might implement anti-democratic policies. Where is the outrage this time?