By Rutvik Oza:
India is in no way an alien land to web censorship. We had all witnessed the arrest of two Palghar women for updating their views on social networking site Facebook. There were a series of arrests there forth, regarding the same issue. And now, yet another similar incident has popped up, as social activist-cum-journalist Alok Dixit’s status update on Facebook has been deleted. The status that read “I love my Pakistan” was removed from Facebook. The victim, Alok Dixit, is currently an active part of “Save Your Voice – A Movement Against Web Censorship.”
The Facebook post was backed by over 880 comments. It got removed from Facebook when some extremists complained regarding the same. While deleting the content, Facebook referred to the statement of rights and responsibilities. Legally, under the statement of rights and responsibilities, a Facebook post can then and only then be deleted when it violates human rights.
According to Alok Dixit, he was just proposing his views within the limits of the freedom of expression from which no citizen of the Indian nation can be deprived. “Facebook removed the content merely on the basis of the complaints made by the extremists. Necessary analysis wasn’t appropriately undertaken,” said the 24-year-old. He also added that he had updated the status for the welfare of the relations between the two nations.
The update “I love my Pakistan” doesn’t seem to violate any human right. Can’t an Indian citizen share his views regarding his love towards a neighbor country? The world’s largest democracy doesn’t seem to believe in providing such basic freedom to its people. Ironic as it may seem, the censored content was posted by the one who fervently fought for the freedom of expression. This clearly stirs up a new debate regarding selective censorship. It leads to the point that the respective authorities wish to silence every voice that is shouted out loud against the system. But I don’t think they understand that, the more you try to compress a spring, the harder it bounces when released.