INDIA Bloc Writes Facebook, Google CEOs To Remain Neutral in Polls : ‘India’, a coalition of opposition parties, has written a letter to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and Google CEO Sundar Pichai. The letter has been shared by Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge on social media. In this, many important things have been said quoting media reports. It says that Meta, Alphabet and especially YouTube are guilty of promoting social disharmony and inciting communal hatred in India. The constituent parties of the opposition alliance Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (India) have written a letter to Mark Zuckerberg, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of social media major Meta and Google CEO Sundar Pichai, criticizing their social media for promoting communal hatred in the country. Protest has been lodged regarding the alleged role of media platforms. They have also demanded that their social media platforms should ensure neutrality in the upcoming elections.
Which leaders are these letters from?
Facebook and WhatsApp are owned by Meta and YouTube is owned by Google. These letters have been written after a news published in the American newspaper Washington Post. Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge has recently shared these letters on ‘X’. These letters have been sent by Congress Organization General Secretary KC Venugopal. On these, the names of 14 opposition leaders including Kharge, former Congress President Rahul Gandhi, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray, Samajwadi Party (SP) President Akhilesh Yadav are mentioned. .
Opposition appeals to WhatsApp and Facebook
In a letter to Zuckerberg, the opposition parties have said that ‘India’ is a coalition of 28 political parties in India, which is ruling in 11 states and represents almost half of the voters of India. In the letter, he said, you will be aware of the recent revelations by the Washington Post newspaper about the role of WhatsApp and Facebook in supporting the communal hate campaign of the ruling BJP. Specifically, this article details how vile and communally divisive propaganda is carried out by BJP members and supporters in WhatsApp groups.
Meta remained neutral in India in view of upcoming elections
The opposition claimed that it is very clear from these detailed investigations by ‘Washington Post’ that Meta is guilty of promoting social disharmony and inciting communal hatred in India. The opposition alliance has demanded that in view of the next Lok Sabha elections and other upcoming elections, META should be run in a neutral manner in India. “Such blatant favoritism and bias towards a political alliance by a private foreign company amounts to interference in India’s democracy, which we at ‘India’ Alliance will not take lightly,” the letter said.
Accusations on Google’s social media platform YouTube
In their letter to Pichai, the opposition parties, citing a Washington Post report, said that it is clear that YouTube is guilty of promoting social disharmony and inciting communal hatred in India. He claimed that the available data proves that Google’s social media platform YouTube is suppressing the content of opposition leaders and promoting the content of ruling party leaders. Opposition leaders said that neutrality should be ensured in the upcoming elections. (Courtesy of input language)