Modi Govt ‘pressurised us’ to block accounts covering farmer protests: Former Twitter CEO

In a big revelation, the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of social media giant Twitter on Tuesday said that the government of India led by Modi allegedly pressurised Twitter officials to block accounts covering farmer protests and those critical of the BJP government.

In an interview with a TV channel, Jack Dorsey said that Modi government threatened the Twitter officials of raid and arrest of its employees in India if they don’t follow the demands.

He was asked if he had faced any pressure from foreign governments.

He replied: “India, for example. India is one of the countries which had many requests around farmers protests, around particular journalists which were critical of the government, and it manifested in ways such as ‘we will shut Twitter down in India’… ‘we would raid the homes of your employees’, which they did; ‘we will shut down your offices if you don’t follow suit’. And this is India, a democratic country.”

Jack Dorsey, who quit as Twitter CEO in 2021, also cited governments in Turkey and Nigeria, which had restricted the platform in their nations at different points over the years before lifting the bans. Turkey, he said, acted “similarly” (like India).

Pertinently, the government of India hastily passed three contentious farm laws in September 2020 that deregulated farming by completely opening it to corporations, forty farm unions with tens of thousands of members responded by leading one of the world’s largest demonstrations. The protest was called off on December 9, a full 378 days later, after the government repealed the laws.

When farmers weren’t allowed to enter New Delhi, India’s capital, they camped at the city’s outskirts.

The GoI later announced the withdrawal of the laws a year later, on November 19, 2021.

Farmers; however, didn’t stop protesting: They continued pressuring government officials to approve their demands, which included compensation to the families of the hundreds of farmers who died during the protests, entitlement to minimum support prices (MSPs), and revoking legal cases against the protesting farmers.