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How Elon Musk’s deal may compound Twitter’s troubles in India

Elon Musk

*Experts have said that all major social media companies view India as a significant market, but also acknowledge that the Asian country is difficult to navigate

Gbenga Kayode | ConsumerConnect

Following his recent $44billion acquisition of the global tech giant, several experts have stated that Twitter could face more run-ins with the Indian Government, if Elon Musk’s takeover of the social media firm goes through.

The experts contended in India, unlike the United States (US), free speech comes with a laundry list of riders.

ConsumerConnect learnt that Twitter has already had several confrontations with the Indian Government, but with a “free speech absolutist” for an owner, things could get decidedly worse for the company in the Asian country.

Twitter on smartphones

“Musk’s $44-billion offer for Twitter may lead to more run-ins with the Indian government and others because of his ‘absolutist’ stance on free speech,” experts said.

They also noted that India’s IT laws make clear that executives at social media intermediaries, including Twitter, are individually and criminally liable for “non-compliance,” ETTech report stated.

Prasanto K Roy, a cyber and tech policy expert, in his comment on the development said:  “Buckling to sweeping takedown demands does not sit well with Musk’s position on free speech. So, I do expect to see conflict, not just in India but even in Europe.”

Experts further said that all major social media companies view India as a significant market, but also acknowledge it is difficult to navigate.

Faisal Kawoosa, a technology analyst and consultant also stated: “It is complex, varied, and unbelievably thin-skinned; just about anything can offend someone or the other,” one industry expert said – a view that was echoed by others as well.

“My fear is that Musk will come up with a global definition of freedom of speech that will be more in line with the Western world view and will not necessarily be suited to how we see freedom of speech.”

Indian Government’s first response to Musk’s transaction

Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar, though he wished Musk all the best, said last Tuesday that the government’s “goals and expectations of accountability, safety and trust of all intermediaries operating in India remain unchanged.”

As regards Twitter, Manish Maheshwari, the former Head of Twitter India and now Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of edtech firm Invact Metaversity, said Jack Dorsey, Cofounder and former CEO of Twitter, and Musk were quite close ideologically and that he wouldn’t be surprised if Dorsey came back to a more powerful role at Twitter.

In regard to China issue, there is also an ongoing debate over whether Musk’s proposed takeover would give China leverage over Twitter, report said.

In his view, Jeff Bezos, Founder and Executive Chairman of Amazon has tweeted: “Did the Chinese Government just gain a bit of leverage over the town square?

“My own answer to this question is probably not. The more likely outcome in this regard is complexity in China for Tesla, rather than censorship at Twitter.

“But we’ll see. Musk is extremely good at navigating this kind of complexity.”

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