NEW DELHI: The Indian Youth Congress (IYC) and National Students Union of India (NSUI) held protest marches on Monday against the temporary suspension of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter account.
The protests come after the Congress on Saturday claimed that Twitter “temporarily suspended” the account of Rahul Gandhi, but later said it has been “temporarily locked” after the microblogging platform denied having suspended the account and stated that it continues to be in service.
The action by Twitter came over a controversial post of Gandhi with a picture of him meeting the family of a nine-year-old SC girl who died here following an alleged sexual assault.
Twitter has deemed that the account violated its rules against posting private information.Leading the protest in front of the Twitter India’s office, IYC national president Srinivas BV alleged that “the Modi government is conspiring to suppress the voice demanding sympathy and justice”.
“Modi ji will not be able to suppress the voice of justice for the daughter by intimidating Twitter, or by blocking the account of Rahul Gandhi ji. Before the unity of India, the British government used to be very afraid, now someone else has taken their place,” the Congress leader said.
A senior police officer said, “Around 40 protestors were detained. However, they were released later.”
A similar protest was held by the Congress party’s student wing NSUI. NSUI said in a statement that the demand of the protest was the “continuation and resumption of his account”.
“Nothing but panic is depicted through this act of central government; they fear that Rahul Gandhi can unveil their ‘truth’ in front of the world, to which the poor management of Covid-19 is a clearly evident proof,” said Neeraj Kundan, national president of NSUI.
With PTI inputs