After RS Prasad, Shashi Tharoor says his Twitter too blocked temporarily

A short while after Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad claimed that he was denied accesss to his Twitter account for almost an hour, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor said he had also faced a similar situation.

Tharoor, who is also the chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology, said that he will be seeking an explanation from Twitter India for the procedures they follow while operating in India and the locking of his and Ravi Shankar Prasad's account.

Ravi Shankar Prasad earlier today took to Koo app to say that Twitter denied him access to his account for alleged violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of the USA. The union minister asserted that the actions of the microblogging site were in gross violation of the Information Technology Rules 2021.

Moments later, Tharoor in a tweet said: "Raviji, the same thing just happened to me. Clearly DMCA is getting hyperactive. This tweet has been deleted by @Twitter because its video includes the copyrighted BoneyM song Rasputin."

However, the Congress leader said he "won't blame Twitter for this action or attribute the motives to them that Ravi Shankar Prasad does", despite admitting that it wasn't pleasant finding his account locked.

"Indians creatively make videos using short snippets of foreign music. Most people would consider that "fair use". Instead of letting the clip enhance the popularity of their sings, the copyright holders have issued notice. Though I just RTd it, I'm not about to contest their act," the Congress leader stated.

He further said that in this case, the complainant was the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which is "zealously defending the rights of Sony Music" to "Rasputin", and added, "Ironically, at their last conference in India, I was a keynote speaker!"

"So I won't blame Twitter for this action or attribute the motives to them that Ravi Shanker Prasad does, though it wasn't pleasant finding my account locked. Clearly, they had no choice but to honour a DMCA takedown notice, however stupid and pointless the request was. But getting a notice from a UK-based organisation, citing Twitter's role as a"service provider" under a US law, points to the challenges of Twitter India's operations in India. Ravi Shankar Prasad has pointed to possible violations of Indian regulations while conforming to foreign rules," Tharoor said.

"As Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology, I can state that we will be seeking an explanation from Twitter India for the locking of Ravi Shankar Prasad's and my accounts and the rules and procedures they follow while operating in India," he added.

In a series of posts on Koo, an Indian microblogging platform, the minister slammed Twitter and said its actions indicate that "they are not the harbinger of free speech that they claim to be" and are "only interested in running their own agenda".

Prasad said no matter what any platform does they will have to abide by the new IT Rules fully and there shall be no compromise on that.