Twitter marks BJP’s Amit Malviya’s tweet as “manipulated media”

12/02/2020 India


Twitter marks BJP's Amit Malviya's tweet as 'manipulated media'

Twitter’s move on Amit Malviya’s tweet sparked a series of reactions.

Highlight

  • BJP’s head of social media tweeted fact-checking on a farmer’s photo
  • Viral image showed a policeman brandishing a cane at a farmer
  • Amit Malviya posted a “propaganda against reality” tweet and Twitter marked a tweet

New Delhi:

A tweet from BJP’s head of social media Amit Malviya has been flagged as “manipulated media” by Twitter. Many noted in tweets that this is the first instance where the social networking site mentions “fake news” in India.

Amit Malviya posted a fact-checking tweet on November 28 about the image of an elderly farmer during a lathi charge by policemen in Haryana during the protests that began last week.

The image, released by various congressional leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, showed a policeman brandishing a baton at the farmer trying to dodge the blow.

Mr. Malviya, responding to Rahul Gandhi’s tweet, posted a “propaganda vs. reality” tweet with a video of it still with the caption: “Rahul Gandhi must be the most discredited opposition leader India has seen in much, long time”. The video showed the policeman raising the baton but the farmer escaping the blow.

But the fact-checking website Alt News posted a longer video of the same incident, which showed police officers beating protesters. Critics accused Malviya of using a cropped video.

Twitter’s “synthetic and manipulated media policy” says: “You may not misleadingly promote synthetic or manipulated media that may cause harm. Additionally, we may tag Tweets that contain synthetic and manipulated media to help people understand their authenticity. and provide additional context. “

The site also said it “can tag Tweets that include media (video, audio and images) that have been altered or misleadingly fabricated.” While he said that in most cases the action was restricted to labeling, the media that check the three warning boxes, are synthetic or manipulated, are misleadingly shared and are likely to cause harm, can be removed.

Newsbeep

Twitter’s move sparked a wave of backlash, with rivals Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) commenting that it was a first in India.

Many users complained that Twitter had not put any warning in Rahul Gandhi’s tweet, but had labeled Malviya’s post as manipulated.

Many users have pointed out that the videos do not make it clear whether the farmer was beaten during the protest. In images posted to Instagram by PTI photographer Ravi Choudhary, who took the original photo tweeted by Rahul Gandhi, the old man appears to have received a blow to the shin, although it could have been at the hands of another police officer.

Ravi Choudhary was quoted by Alt News as saying: “I clicked on the image from the other side and it cannot be said for sure whether the cane touched the farmer or not because there was a lot of commotion at the time. The police were lathi- charging at the protesters and the farmer was running in the other direction to save himself. He may have been hit by another cop before, if not this one. “

As thousands of farmers marched to Delhi last week to protest against the center’s new agricultural laws, they faced tear gas, batons and water cannons at various points in Haryana, which used great force to try to block them.

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