The microblogging platform Twitter has approached the central government seeking more time to comply with the new IT rules, as per Media reports.
Twitter has said that it intends to comply with the rules but needs more time due to the pandemic situation in India.
Twitter has written to Meity (Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology) seeking more time to comply with the IT rules. It has expressed its intent to abide by the rules but has been unable to do so because of the pandemic.
The response from Twitter comes after the government, last week, issued a strongly-worded final notice to the company regarding its non-compliance with the new rules.
Rakesh Maheshwari, group coordinator for cyberlaw at the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), in a letter to Twitter’s deputy general counsel Jim Baker, stated, “The refusal to comply demonstrates Twitter’s Lack of commitment and efforts towards providing a safe experience for the people of India on its platform. The world’s largest democracy has been among the first countries in the world, outside the parent country of Twitter Inc, to adopt the Twitter platform enthusiastically.”
“Despite being operational in India for more than a decade, it is beyond belief that Twitter Inc. has doggedly refused to create mechanisms that will enable the people of India to resolve their issues on the platform in a timely and transparent manner and through fair processes, by India based, clearly identified resources. Leave alone proactively creating such a mechanism, and Twitter Inc. is in the inglorious bracket of refusing to do so even when mandated by law,” the letter further stated.
The new IT rules for social media companies that came into effect last month mandate large platforms like Facebook and Twitter to undertake greater due diligence and make these digital platforms more accountable and responsible for the content hosted by them.
The rules also require significant social media intermediaries – providing services primarily like messaging to enable identification of the “first originator” of the information that undermines the sovereignty of India, the security of the state, or public order.
