X, formerly Twitter, is once again restricting content in India. The company's Global Government Affairs account announced that the The Indian government had issued an order requiring X to withhold specific accounts and posts or face sanctions including “significant fines and imprisonment.” X further stated that he did not agree with the order and was contesting it.
Designated positions and accounts will only be blocked in India. However, there is no clear list of those affected. “Due to legal restrictions, we are unable to publish the executive orders, but we believe that making them public is essential for transparency,” the Global Government Affairs newspaper said. “This lack of disclosure can lead to a lack of accountability and arbitrary decision-making.” X claims to have informed all parties concerned.
The messages are likely centered on the ongoing farmers' protest, which since February 13 has seen several farmers' unions on strike in a bid to secure a floor price, or minimum support price, for crops sold . Violent clashes between demonstrators and police have already left at least one dead, AP News reports. Mohammed Zubair, Indian journalist and co-founder of Alt News, shared purported screenshots of suspended accounts belonging to individuals critical of the current government, journalists on the ground, prominent agricultural unionists, etc.
This forced blockade is far from the first incident between X and India. In 2022, X sued the Indian government for “arbitrarily and disproportionately” enforcing its information technology laws. passed the previous year. The law required the company to hire a point of contact for local authorities and a national compliance officer. Before this concession, in early 2021, the Indian government had threatened to imprison X employees if posts about the then-ongoing farmers' protest remained online on the site. Shortly after, the country ordered X to remove any content critical of its response to COVID-19.
India rejected X's complaint in June 2023, saying the company failed to properly explain why it delayed complying with the country's IT laws. The court also imposed a fine of X5 million rupees ($60,300), saying: “You are not a farmer but a billion-dollar company.” The order followed shortly after the co-founder of Twitter Jack Dorsey claimed India threatened to search employees' homes and shut down the site if the company had not cut jobs during the farmers' protest.