Modi’s BJP Government Suspends Indian Twitter Accounts of Hindus for Human Rights and Indian American Muslim Council
- The human rights groups say the suspension continues the Indian government’s broader crackdown on critical voices in media and politics, which escalated in recent weeks.
Twitter/X accounts of two U.S.-based human rights organizations — Hindus for Human Rights (HfHR) and Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC) — have been suspended in India. On Oct. 14, the two groups, who are close allies, learned that their X accounts were withheld in India in response to a “legal demand” from the Indian government. The IAMC says it was notified two days after the suspension that the account had been withheld after X received “a legal removal demand from the Government of India… that claims the following content violates India’s Information Technology Act, 2000.”
“The Modi government is attempting to silence our voice by shutting down our Twitter account in India in collusion with Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter),’ HfHR said in a press release. “There was no prior intimation by X, nor does it have an appeal process for this type of suspension, except in a court of law,” the group said. It noted that the Modi government is “using their pal Elon Musk to shut down the only voice of progressive Hindus, which is speaking out against the danger of Hindutva ideology and the Modi government’s anti-minority actions, which run counter to the basic values of Hinduism.”
“BJP leaders, including BJP IT Cell Head Amit Malviya and Cabinet Minister Smriti Irani, and right-wing media outlets in India launched a coordinated online campaign to smear our Executive Director Sunita Viswanath as an agent of George Soros — invoking well-known antisemitic tropes about Soros and attacking Sunita’s marriage to her husband, who is Jewish.”
HfHR notes in the press release that “the mighty Modi raj is scared of a movement of progressive Hindus and their supporters speaking up to save Indian democracy. Their action shows that our truth-telling, our constant insistence on justice, have become a thorn in their side. The truth frightens them.” Noting that there is “a coordinated plan of transnational repression by the Modi government, assisted by their eager partners in the diaspora,” HfHR says this action against them “may well represent the beginning of a massive clampdown of anti-Modi voices prior to the 2024 elections in India.”
According to the IAMC, the suspension of the accounts “continues the Indian government’s broader crackdown on critical voices in media and politics, which escalated in recent weeks.” The group refers to the Indian government filing criminal charges against prominent novelist Arundhati Roy and raiding the offices of the Independent news organization NewsClick and arresting its editor-in-chief.
IAMC executive director Rasheed Ahmed said the group’s X account
“serves as an important medium for Indian American Muslims to shine a light on Hindu nationalism and worsening human rights conditions of persecuted minority groups in India.” He said “silencing our voice on social media is an affront not just to our organization but to the democracy in the United States and India. Noting that “Musk is working hand in glove with Modi’s authoritarian regime to block a U.S.-based organization,” IAMC accused the social media platform of “accelerating the suppression of free expression and democracy in India and the U.S.”
“Although this is by far the Indian state’s most blatant effort yet to silence HfHR, it is not the first time that we have been targeted by India’s BJP government,” the group says in the press release. Earlier this year, “BJP leaders, including BJP IT Cell Head Amit Malviya and Cabinet Minister Smriti Irani, and right-wing media outlets in India launched a coordinated online campaign to smear our Executive Director Sunita Viswanath as an agent of George Soros — invoking well-known antisemitic tropes about Soros and attacking Sunita’s marriage to her husband, who is Jewish,” the press release said. “We will not be silenced or stopped, HfHR says,” adding that “as long as people like Umar Khalid, Teesta Setalvad, Harsh Mander, Arundhati Roy, Newsclick, Amnesty India ….. we will stand with them. The resistance movement against Hindutva will grow like a tidal wave and engulf the hatred. That day will come.”