‘Don’t lecture us on freedom of speech,’ Ravi Shankar Prasad tells social media companies

Social media companies should not “lecture” India on democracy and freedom of speech, Union Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said at an event on Saturday, PTI reported. He asserted that these companies will have to follow Indian laws if they were to do business in the country.

Prasad’s comment came amid a tussle between social media firms and the Centre on the new Information Technology rules that were introduced in February and came to effect last month. The rules are a sweeping set of regulations framed to regulate social media companies, streaming and digital news content, virtually bringing them, for the first time, under the ambit of government supervision.

Addressing a lecture on the topic ‘Social Media & Social Security and Criminal Justice System Reforms: An Unfinished Agenda’, Prasad, defended the new rules, suggesting they do not deal with the use of social media, but with its “abuse and misuse”.

Outlining the major regulations, the Union minister said that the rules require social media companies to set up an India-based grievance redressal officer, compliance officer and a nodal officer.

“These are basic requirements,” Prasad said. “Let me reiterate emphatically that India does not need a lecture on freedom of speech and democracy from a profit-making company that stays in America. India…

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