The Twitter account of Punjab’s biggest farmers union Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) Ekta Ugrahan, protesting at Delhi’s border, was restricted on Saturday. The US-based social media giant also sent notices to cartoonist Manjul, fact-checking website Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair and others to take down certain tweets.
Sources said the Ministry of Electronics and IT was not involved in sending these legal requests to Twitter. It wasn’t clear which agencies have flagged these tweets by and for what violations.
Restricting the BKU Ekta Ugrahan handle, Twitter said “Caution: This account is temporarily restricted”. “You’re seeing this warning because there has been some unusual activity from this account,” it said.
Ugrahan had sparked controversy last year by commemorating the International Human Rights Day on December 10 by holding up posters of detained activists such as Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Sudha Bhardwaj and Gautam Navlakha, among others.
Meanwhile, the screenshot shared by Manjul showed Twitter as saying: “In the interest of transparency, we are writing to inform you that Twitter has received a request from Indian law enforcement regarding your Twitter account @MANJULtoons... that claims the content violates the law(s) of India”.
It further stated that Twitter has “not taken any action on the reported content at this time as a result of this request”.
Mails sent to Manjul, and others do not mention the details of the law enforcement agency that had raised the legal request.
Twitter, in its notice, said it is the company’s policy to notify users if it receives a legal request from an authorised entity (such as law enforcement or a government agency) to remove content from their account. Twitter further informed the account holders that while the platform is unable to provide legal advice, “We want you to have an opportunity to evaluate the request and, if you wish, take appropriate action to protect your interests.”
“This may include seeking legal counsel and challenging the request in court, contacting relevant civil society organisations, voluntarily deleting the content (if applicable), or finding some other resolution,” Twitter added.
Twitter has been facing heat for delay in complying with the IT rules that mandate large digital platforms to undertake greater due diligence.