Twitter VS modi government : Ravi Shankar Prasad's Twitter account banned

 Hello, friends! Yesterday, our Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad's Twitter account was banned for an hour by Twitter. Not a month, not even a day, you heard it absolutely right,it was banned for 1 hour. By the way, Ravi Shankar Prasad is a very important minister.

 He has been given 3 portfolios. He is the Minister of Law and Justice, Minister of Electronics and Information Technology and also the Minister of Communications. One person, three ministries. He found it very peculiar. He tweeted: "Friends! Something highly peculiar happened today. Twitter denied access to my account for almost an hour on the alleged grounds that there was a violation of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act of the USA." He was amazed at how it could happen. Twitter banned an account for an hour. Based on a copyright act. After this, #Ban_twitter_in_Indiastarted to trend on Twitter. People were enraged at what Twitter had done. How dare Twitter ban our politician's accountfor 1 hour? We want Twitter to be banned altogether. That's why we'll go on Twitterto ask for a ban on Twitter. Ravi Shankar Prasad also said that Twitter has an agenda here. That Twitter is trying to silence free speech. And making any arbitrary decisions. 

But in the statement provided by Twitter as a response they said that it was only a copyright issue. Because of which they took the action. If you've ever used social media, if you've tried to upload any video onFacebook or Twitter, with a Bollywood song in it, you would've faced the same thing too. I too have faced it. And that video is removed because of copyright issues. If some media websites are to be believed, Ravi Shankar Prasad faced exactly this. He had uploaded a video that had AR Rahman's song 'Maa Tujhe Salam'. And because of that song, Sony's music company flagged his tweet as a copyright violation. And Twitter probably has this rule that it bans the account for a few hours. If you violate a copyright. Like YouTube's rule. I don't know the exact rules that Twitter has regarding this. But on YouTube, if you get three strikes for copyright violation, YouTube deletes the entire channel. Nowadays, every social media user knows this. But our law minister, who's responsible for overseeing laws and their enforcement, doesn't know this law. And found it very 'peculiar'. 

He thinks that Twitter has a hidden agenda. Not only this, our news channels began running headlines "What is Twitter's Conspiracy Behind It?" "What Hidden Agenda Does Twitter Have?" "Blocking IT Minister's handle is Twitter's action vengeful? That's the question we're asking..." "Why did Twitter continue to reward them with blue ticks?" This isn't new. Over the last few months, I saw this at least 4 or 5 times, #Ban_Twitter started trending on Twitter! Whenever you go to join any social media network, they have a long page of Terms and Conditions on which you have to click 'I Agree.' Before you can join it. It isn't that Twitter is forcing you or coercing you into joining Twitter. There is no coercion. Don't join it if you don't agree with theirTerms and Conditions. It isn't even that the Terms and Conditions are out of the ordinary. That goes against human rights or something. As long as you haven't done any spamming activity, or haven't cursed at or abused someone from your account, or you haven't created a fake account, the chances of your account being banned on Twitter is next to impossible. Three weeks ago, when Ban Twitter was trending on Twitter the reason behind it was that the blue ticks of some of the members of the BJP and RSS the verified checkmarks on Twitter, were removed. So people start calling for Twitter to be banned because of it. As if it is the blue tick mark that measures the importance or worth of the user. I haven't got a blue tick on Twitter yet. That doesn't mean that I go and start crying "How can Twitter do this? Ban Twitter now!"

 It is the same as you starting to play PUB-G and you cannot unlock an achievement in PUB-G so then you start saying that PUB-G should be banned while you're on PUB-G. You're still playing PUB-G, but while you're playing you're writing "Ban PUB-G". Everyone should stop playing PUB-G. Because PUB-G doesn't give me this achievement. Because I can't cross this level, Ban PUB-G. It's the same. No one is being forced here. The problem is, friends,that some people in our country, don't consider politicians to be politicians. They've started to see the politicians as theirmum and dad. -"If Akhilesh is your brother, is Mr Modi your uncle?" -"Not my uncle..."-"Then who?" "He is the father of this nation." -"Who is?"-"He is the Prime Minister." "He may be your father but he isn't this country's father." -"He definitely is." -"He may be your father, he isn't our." Just last month, in Finland, the Finnish police started a probe against the Prime Minister of Finland. Not the ex-Prime Minister,rather their current Prime Minister. 

Her name is Sanna. A probe was started into her. You'd think that there might've been a huge corruption scandal. No. Allegedly, the Finnish Prime Minister claimed her monthly breakfast bill of $365 while residing at the official residence. We aren't talking about 365 million. Not even $365,000. It only $365. Even for this little amount a probe was started against their Prime Minister. The investigation is still going on into this. But let's compare it with our India. Here, one of the Union Minister's Twitter account was banned for one hour, and people became enraged. Because how could Twitter dare to do this? Who is Twitter to question our mum and dad? Did someone try to discuss if there was a genuine reason behind Twitter's action? It may have been done because of a valid reason. Or it may simply have been a mistake by Twitter. But no. People are more interested in asking how could Twitter dare to do it? Our politicians who are already so full of themselves considering themselves to be VIPs, inflate their ego a little more. By saying all these. What is this if not a kind of a slave mindsetor a feudal mindset? And then these people claim that they admireBhagat Singh. Actually friends, the entire 'Ban Twitter' controversy had started somewhat like this. Sambit Patra had tweeted blaming Congress of making a toolkit for defaming the government on the issues of Covid and the Central Vista. Several BJP politicians likePriti Gandhi and JP Nadda had amplified this tweet. 

The Pliable Media ran headlines at primetime. "Toolkit Gang" How Congress made a toolkit to defame the government. Congress then complained that the document presented as the 'toolkit' is totally fabricated. It is a fake document. AltNews ran a fact check on it and discovered that there were a lot of inconsistencies. In the font styles and page numbering. And concluded that the screenshots of the document presented as the toolkit is a document made on a forged letterhead. After this, Twitter marked it as 'manipulated media'. That fake news is being propagated of a toolkit. The AltNews founder Pratik Sinha had even challenged BJP that if they want to prove that the toolkit document is genuine they should present the original document. He kept on tweeting every day for days. Asking them to do it. But till now BJP members have not presented any original documents. The status remained the sameeven after 10-12 days. But the government now wants to prove that this matter is under investigation. After this, there was an uproar. The uproar wasn't because BJP leaders used a forged letterhead to spread fake news. The uproar was because the tweets of BJP leaders was marked as 'manipulated media' by Twitter. "What does Twitter think of itself that it marks the fake news by BJP leadersas fake news?" "Do they think so highly of themselves?" The government held its stance that Twitter could not mark this as fake news because the matter is under investigation. 

The first case of the 'manipulated media' tag was seen in December 2020. During the Farmers' Protest. Rahul Gandhi had shared a photo of the Farmers' protest where a Jawan (soldier) was seen aiming his stick at a farmer. He said that it is a very sad photo. "Our slogan was 'Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan'(Victorious Soldier, Victorious Farmer) but today PM Modi's arrogance made the Jawans stand against the farmers." In its response, the BJP IT Cell head Amit Malviya shared a video showing that the soldier hadn't even touched the farmer. Several fact-checking websites said that Amit Malviya is showing a clipped video where it is not shown. So Amit Malviya's lie came to light with the original video. And Amit Malviya's tweet was tagged as 'manipulated media' by Twitter. The root of all problems is this. Because it's basically clear that all the instances of 'Ban Twitter stems from that somewhere the BJP politicians are irritated by the fact that Twitter keeps tagging their politicians with 'manipulated media'. How their fake newsis being called out for being fake news. Now the most interesting argument in this whole situation to me is that some people say that Twitter is an American company and on the other side, we have our Indian Government. We're Indian and they're Americans. So they claim that obviously, we should support India. That the Indian Government should be supported regardless of what they do. These are the people who are willing to blindly accept anything as long as it is 'Made in India'. Recently there was the news of Twitter being banned in Nigeria. And the Koo app is getting famous in Nigeria. And some people are starting to feel very proud because of this. Claiming that this is a win for our country. 

That an Indian app is gaining popularity there. And that an American app has been banned. But have any of these people tried to find out the reason why did it happen? Why was Twitter banned there? Because Twitter had deleted a tweet from the Nigerian President. And what was the tweet? It was actually promoting genocide. There a group was being threatened with genocide by their President. Which is really dangerous. So is it something to be proud of that we are going to a country and supporting a government that threatens people with genocide? Some people also argue that Twitter is an American company and has to follow Indian rules if it wants to be in India. And by 'rules' they mean the new 'IT Rules'. First, this doesn't make any sense. If tomorrow the government comes up with any illogical rule does that mean that all the companies have to follow it? Suppose the government comes up with a law that every Indian playing PUB-G will get an extra advantage as compared tothe non-India players. Only then will PUB-G be allowed in India. Does this rule make any sense? If tomorrow the government comes up with a new rule saying that every message sent through WhatsApp will now be visible to everyone publicly. The WhatsApp messages wouldn't remain private. It will be publicly published on a website. Every single message sent by every user. Would it make any sense then? That they need to follow Indian rules because they're in India. That WhatsApp and all of us need to follow the rule. But the second and more important point is that in the new IT Rules, your freedom of speech your overall freedom is being restricted. I explained it in detail in the video on IT Rules. I'll put the link to it in the description below if you want to know about it in detail.

 Overall, friends, I'm not saying that Twitter is 100% right here and the government is 100% wrong. Twitter is also wrong in several places. There are times when Twitter makes the wrong decision. And those need to be pointed out. All I'm saying that don't worship the government. Don't think of them as your mum or dad. If you start doing this,then your life will not improve. Understand the real importance of Democracy.

 Any private company should not be idolized. Neither should any politician be idolized. It is only the common citizen that should matter. 

Thank you!