After pop star Rihanna, porn star Mia Khalifa and school dropout ‘activist’ Greta Thunberg, the latest to join the coterie of influencers unleashing anti-India propaganda is Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.
Dorsey already has a history of interfering into India’s internal matters and now the CEO of the micro-blogging site has exposed his anti-India bias by endorsing unsubstantiated tweets hailing singer-actress Rihanna who has called for intervention into India’s domestic politics.
Global Opinions Editor of The Washington Post, Karen Attiah, on Tuesday hailing Rihanna’s intervention tweeted that Rihanna has ‘shook the Indian Government’.
She also stated that the pop star has raised her voice for social justice movements in Sudan, Nigeria, Myanmar and now in India.
Karen also demanded that Twitter come out with an emoji in support of the ‘farmer’ protests like they did for Black Lives Matter.
All these tweets were liked by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey who was recently pulled up by the Indian Government for giving space to a controversial hashtag that claimed that India was carrying out a ‘farmer genocide’. Around 250 accounts were withheld for tweeting, or retweeting, with the #ModiPlanningFarmerGenocide hashtag, and making “fake, intimidatory and provocative tweets” in connection with the ongoing ‘farmers’ protest. But the social media giant began unlocking some of them later. Many Twitter handles including that of anti-Hindu and anti-India magazine The Caravan, Rahul Gandhi fan lady Sanjukta Basu, founder of Tribal Army Hansraj Meena were withheld. However, Twitter restored them within hours.
For a long time, Twitter has used its unilateral power to promote or silence individuals or hashtags. Several prominent Indians who are on the opposite side of the left have often complained that their number of followers never increases because Twitter won’t allow it.
Twitter, has brazenly tried to regulate to silence its critics and nationalist voices not only in India but across the globe by censoring content and suspending accounts without any explanation. JNU Professor and TV Panelist Dr Anand Ranganathan had his account suspended when he had not even come close to violating twitters policy of abuse and racism. When his account was reinstated, Twitter did not give any explanation and only said that it happened due to a technical glitch. Similarly, True Indology, the prominent handle which shares information on history has also been a victim’s Twitter’s censorship.
Some analyst think Jack’s anti-India stand is due Modi government issuing a notice to Twitter for violating Indian laws that had forced Twitter to block them 250 tweets after the controversial hashtag trended on the platform on the January 30.
(With inputs from OpIndia)