Muzzling voices: Modi govt withholds 100 Social Media accounts linked to farmers’ agitation
Jalandhar: As the protesting Indian farmers were set to resume their march to Delhi today to press for their demands, the Narendra Modi-led government withheld around 100 X (formerly Twitter) accounts belonging to farmer union leaders and people promoting the farmers’ cause.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha the two umbrella bodies leading the farmers’ protests, have called on farmers from across India to join them in Delhi today.
At the Shambhu, Khanauri and Dabwali borders between Punjab and Haryana, farmer unions under the leadership of Jagjeet Singh Dallewal from the SKM Non-Political and Sarvan Singh Pandher of the KMM have been protesting against the Modi government demanding legally guaranteed minimum support prices (MSP) for crops, pension for farmers and farm labourers, farm debt waiver, and no hike in electricity tariffs.
In a media interview, farmer union leader Gurpreet Sangha said that overnight, around 100 social media accounts belonging to farmers, farmer union leaders and people supporting the protest were withheld in India on Tuesday, exactly a day before the Delhi Chalo call for March 6 (today). “Till date, the government has withheld my three X accounts, which I made after each one of them was blocked in India”, he said.
Sangha said that the government does not want their voice to reach the masses. “The government’s message is clear: that they will not even let the farmers speak, leave alone the debate of right or wrong,” he added.
On today’s ‘Delhi Chalo’ call, Sangha said that whether it is 100 farmers or 10,000, they will simply reach Jantar Mantar in Delhi and sit there in protest. “It is a purely organic announcement, where farmers from the rest of the country other than Punjab and Haryana would lead the protest,” he said.
It is for the third time that the Indian government has withheld social media accounts ever since the protest started on February 13. Earlier too, the government had withheld over a dozen social media accounts belonging to farmer union leaders as well as the official pages of farmer unions and their supporters a day before the Delhi Chalo call on the night of February 12. Similarly, many social media accounts, particularly those on X, Facebook and Instagram, were again withheld in the wake of Delhi Chalo call on February 21.
Farmer union leaders termed it as a modus operandi of the Modi government, where social media accounts were being repeatedly withheld in bulk whenever they gave a call to move to Delhi.
