Parliamentary panel on IT summons Google, Facebook on June 29

Amid tussle with micro-blogging platform Twitter over the new IT rules, the Parliament Standing Committee on Information and Technology has now summoned the representatives of Facebook India and Google India on June 29 to hear their views on safeguarding citizens’ rights and prevention of misuse of social online news media platforms.

Earlier this month, the Parliamentary Standing Committee had also summoned Twitter to give representation on how to prevent misuse of social media and online news.

Twitter and the Centre have been at loggerheads over several issues for the last few months. Just yesterday, Twitter’s interim resident grievance officer for India, Dharmendra Chatur stepped down days after he was appointed as per the new IT guidelines.

Twitter is already under pressure to comply with the new norms and has faced severe criticism from the government along with warnings of legal proceedings.
On June 20, India’s permanent mission at the United Nations had clarified that India’s new IT rules are “designed to empower ordinary users of social media” and that they were finalised after the government held broad consultations with civil society and other stakeholders in 2018.

The Central government has framed the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (‘new IT Rules’) and notified the same on February 25, 2021. The Rules have come into effect from May 26. ANI