Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey on Monday, June 12 publicly said that Indian authorities threatened to shut the microblogging platform in the country if it did not act against the dissenting voices during the farmers’ protest.
Interestingly, Dorsey made the comments during an interview with YouTube channel Breaking Points when asked to give examples of foreign governments putting pressure on Twitter to comply with their demands.
“India, for example, had many requests of us around the farmers’ protest – around particular journalists that were critical of the government,” the former Twitter chief executive officer said. “It manifested in ways such as ‘we will shut Twitter down in India’…and ‘we will raid the homes of your employees’ – which they did.”
The historic months long farmers protest had enthused citizens all over the country. As many as 128 participants of the farmers struggle died between May 26, 2021 and September 21, 2021, said the farmers group Samyukta Kisan Morcha’s (SKM) ‘Human Cost of Farmers Protest’ blog.
This takes the total death toll to 605 people, who have died since November 24, 2020, when the Delhi Chalo Farmers campaign first started in India. Each of these individuals had travelled to the national capital’s borders to demand the repeal of the three farm laws – Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance & Farm Services Act, the Farmer’s Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act – the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 and the legalisation of MSP among other demands.
Besides, Dorsey also said that Indian authorities threatened to shut down Twitter’s offices in the country if the company did not comply with its requests. “…And this is India, a democratic country,” he added. However, Union Minister of State for Electronics and Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar on Tuesday, June 13 dismissed Dorsey’s claims as an outright lie.
The impact of the protest on social media platform twitter had been profound. For example, a report in Sabrangindia dated September 25, 2020, just a few months after the worst impact of India’s Covid-19 lockdown were being felt, three #hashtags supporting the farmers movement were trending on twitter.
“By early afternoon of September 25, hashtags supporting farmers’ and workers’ defiance to the recent agriculture and labour laws were trending on Twitter.
Swaraj India leader Yogendra Yadav who attended protests in Haryana posted a screenshot that showed #BharatBandh #NoToFarmerBills and #ScrapAntiFarmerActs as the top three trending hashtags in India.
Similarly, the three-day long “rail roko” agitation of Punjab farmers was leading on Twitter news. However, the star of the Twitter trend show was its neighbouring state that sent in visuals of dissent from every nook and cranny of Haryana.”
Union Minister of State for Electronics and Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar rubbished the interview, however. “Dorsey’s Twitter regime had a problem accepting the sovereignty of Indian law,” he claimed. “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 said that during the farmers’ protest, there was a lot of misinformation and “even reports of genocide” that were definitely fake. He appeared to have been referring to tweets from 2021, with the hashtag #ModiPlanningFarmerGenocide, which the Centre had directed Twitter to hold back. “To set the record straight, no one was raided or sent to jail,” the Union minister added on Tuesday.
“Our focus was only on ensuring the compliance of Indian laws.”
This is an outright lie by @jack – perhaps an attempt to brush out that very dubious period of twitters history
This is an outright lie by @jack – perhaps an attempt to brush out that very dubious period of twitters history
Facts and truth@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 law… https://t.co/SlzmTcS3Fa
— Rajeev Chandrasekhar 🇮🇳 (@Rajeev_GoI) June 13, 2023
The interview has caused outrage and indignation in India, however. Several Opposition leaders reacted sharply to Dorsey’s claims about pressure on Twitter from the Union government. Indian Youth Congress president Srinivas BV shared excerpts from the interview on Twitter with the caption: “Mother of Democracy – Unfiltered.”
Mother of Democracy – Unfiltered
Mother of Democracy – Unfiltered
“During farmer protest, Modi govt pressurized us and said we will shut down your offices, raid your employees’ homes, which they did if you don’t follow suit.”
– Jack Dorsey, former Twitter CEO pic.twitter.com/tOyCfyDWcz
— Srinivas BV (@srinivasiyc) June 12, 2023
Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) MP Priyanka Chaturvedi alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre “tried to arm-twist social media platforms to mute the voices of those supporting the farmers”.
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…— Priyanka Chaturvedi🇮🇳 (@priyankac19) June 13, 2023
In February 2021, the government asked Twitter to remove hundreds of accounts that criticised the Centre over its handling of the widespread farmers’ protests that started in November 2020. According to the reports at the time, the social media platform initially refused, but eventually relented after its local employees were threatened with prison time.
The Centre had also then repeatedly criticized Twitter for not fully complying with the new Information Technology rules that came into force in May 2021.In August, a former security chief of Twitter, Peter Zatko had alleged that the Indian government forced the social media company to put one of its “agents” on its payroll. Zatko had also alleged that the “agent” was given access to user data when the government was facing “intense protests”