[KrishnaShripad]

> I think this is mostly about Twitter's refusal to censor on behalf of the Indian government; see eg https://www.vice.com/en/article/5d3bmn/twitter-censorship-in...

I'll explain the context behind this because Vice (as is usual with Western media propaganda outlets) does not provide any details.

The "journalist" in question, who goes by the handle @zoo_bear, tweeted out a clip from a heated National TV debate between a ruling party spokesperson and another Islamic scholar. Some unsavory remarks were made by the Islamic scholar on the ruling party spokesperson's Religious beliefs (she is a Hindu). She retaliated in the TV debate with her own unsavory remarks on his Islamic beliefs.

Now this "journalist", instead of putting out the entire clip, decided to cut the clip to only show the spokesperson's remarks which went viral not just in India but across the World. She not only received beheading/death threats but was also forced to apologize, tender resignation from the Party and go into hiding. Then after that, 4 other Hindus (completely unconnected to this TV debate) were beheaded, by Islamic terrorists, as a "revenge" for what she said. Only later did the entire clip surface and things cooled down. But by then, the damage was done. Was any of this reported by Vice? Nope. This is the kind of propaganda that Western media outlets indulge in.

Now the Government of India wanted to take this out-of-context Tweet down (as well as suspend the "journalist"s account) as he continued to put out partial information just to keep the communal pot boiling.

India is a multi-cultural, multi-religious democracy with a billion+ people. Any riots that break out has potential to turn into communal clashes on a pan-India scale. The Government, unlike Western Governments, has extra responsibility to take care of the social fabric of the Nation apart from protecting the country from adversaries on our borders.

So the Government of India is perfectly justified in requesting take down. Twitter not taking it down is purely politically motivated. It is not like it hasn't taken down accounts/tweets at all. It has done so multiple times on behest of opposition party members.

[nl]

Note that this explanation is only one of the (many) incidents outlined in the (long) Vice post. As the Vice article points out, the tweet was over 4 years old when he was arrested for it. The Indian article[1] about the arrest doesn't make any claims about the tweet going viral or being responsible for the things the OP is claiming here. Notably neither the police themselves not the complainant make these claims.

This quote summarises the overall situation reasonably well:

> A 2021 transparency report released by Twitter revealed that India was the single largest source of government takedown requests in the second half of 2020—accounting for 25 percent of the global volume. The compliance rate for these requests was 0.6 percent in India, as opposed to 30 percent globally.

[1] https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/delhi/altnews-co-fo...

[KrishnaShripad]

> Note that this explanation is only one of the (many) incidents outlined in the (long) Vice post

Where is this explanation? There is not even one mention of Nupur Sharma in the Vice article. Quote from the article.

> the tweet was over 4 years old when he was arrested for it

Nice deflection. This is not the tweet I was talking about.

I was talking about this: https://www.opindia.com/2022/06/islamist-mobs-nupur-sharma-p...

and this https://www.opindia.com/2022/06/alt-news-mohammed-zubair-del...

> The Indian article[1] about the arrest doesn't make any claims about the tweet going viral or being responsible for the things the OP is claiming here.

Of course the Indian Authorities are going to charge him for the most heinous/offensive tweet. And they will choose the one that will stick when they prosecute him in a Court of Law. That does not mean what he did, did not lead to beheading of 4 innocent Hindus. This is well documented fact that the communal tension was result of him sharing a doctored clip that went viral.

> The Indian article[1] about the arrest doesn't make any claims about the tweet going viral or being responsible for the things the OP is claiming here

LMFAO from Indian Express of all the papers? The ones who falsely published a report that Indian Army had moved towards Delhi to do a coup on the previous Government of India? [1] and [2].

Please refer to better sources.

> A 2021 transparency report released by Twitter revealed that India was the single largest source of government takedown requests in the second half of 2020—accounting for 25 percent of the global volume

Ah yes. And we should take Twitter at its word. Twitter can also reveal exactly what those tweets were which the GoI wanted taken down. I bet at least half of them involve some fabrication (like The Wire BS that is currently being propagated) or something communal to stoke riots and unrest in India.

[1]: https://www.businessinsider.com/indian-newspaper-slammed-for...

[2]: https://www.sundayguardianlive.com/news/upa-2-top-leaders-wa...