Parliament panel lambasts Twitter for act of ‘treason’

NEW DELHI: Parliamentarians on Wednesday slammed social media company Twitter for showing Leh as part of China, saying it amounted to treason. They also demanded an apology in an affidavit, after Twitter executives verbally apologised for the mistake at the meeting of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) on the data protection bill.

The flashpoint was an incident last week when a journalist started a live Twitter broadcast from a memorial in Leh and realised that the location said People’s Republic of China.The incident prompted the secretary of the ministry of electronics and information technology (Meity) to write to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to express the government’s disapproval .

“Leh being shown as a part of China can be construed as an act of treason and is punishable with up to seven years of imprisonment,” chair of the committee Meenakshi Lekhi said. “The committee was unanimous in flagging the issue and expressed its stern disapproval.”

At the meeting, Twitter representatives offered an apology, but when they said the issue has been resolved keeping in mind India’s sensitivity, it further irked the members of the panel. Lekhi and Biju Janata Dal leader Bhartuhari Mahtab firmly maintained that this wasn’t about sensitivities but about India’s sovereignty and integrity. The lawmakers maintained that Twitter has “attacked” India’s integrity and sovereignty.

After the incident created a furore, Twitter had said: “The recent geo-tagging issue was swiftly resolved by our teams. We are committed to openness, transparency around our work and will remain in regular touch with the government to share timely updates.”

The JPC is meeting large tech companies such as Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Twitter to understand their view on personal data protection. India’s Personal Data Protection bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha last December. Among other provisions, this seeks to create a regulator, the Data Protection Authority to protect the personal data of individuals.

Amazon, which originally said travel restrictions made it difficult for the company’s experts from the US to appear before the committee, sent a team from its local office to meet the JPC after the latter saw the company’s initial response as “breach of privilege”.

Amazon vehemently opposed restrictions in cross-border data transfer.

JPC IS MEETING TECH FIRMS TO UNDERSTAND THEIR VIEWS ON PERSONAL DATA PROTECTION