Former Co-founder and CEO of Twitter Jack Dorsey, has said that the Narendra Modi-led government in India asked to block accounts covering farmers’ protests and those criticized the government in India.
Even the company was informed that the offices of Twitter in India will be shut down and raids will be conducted against the employees if orders were not followed. He also emphasized this was happening in a democratic country like India.
The Narendra Modi-led Indian government made a significant announcement in November 2021 by repealing three contentious farm laws. This decision came after a year-long protest by thousands of farmers who had been camping at Delhi border points since November 2020.
In early 2021, Twitter was ordered to suspend hundreds of accounts and curtail the visibility of certain hashtags in India, after the Indian government issued threats of legal action against the company.
In an interview with the YouTube channel Breaking Points, he was asked by hosts if current Twitter owner Elon Musk has lived up to his own free speech commitments on the platform.
Jack Dorsey said, “We were more, you know, ideally going for a global appreciation of free speech and free expression itself and Elon took on a principle of anything that’s allowed by law on the platform, which sets up a dynamic where you have countries like India and Turkey who made many requests to us back in the day to take down particular journalist accounts or give contact information and to remove them from the platform.”
“So I think it’s easier to do in the US. We have been transparent about all government in the US,” Dorsey added.
However on his claims the Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said, Twitter was in “repeated and continuous violations of India law” and at times “weaponised misinformation”.
Commenting on this Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal says, “First of all, I would like to know, why would Jack Dorsey make such a statement? Rajeev Chandrasekhar says that this is a lie. Why would he tell a lie? There is no reason for Jack Dorsey to tell a lie that they threatened Twitter when the protests were going on, that they would shut their offices & raid the then Twitter employees…There is every reason for others to tell a lie because they can’t accept this…”
