Twitter locks official handle of Congress party

On Thursday, the Congress party claimed that the Twitter handles of its party, and 5000 leaders and workers have been locked, amid growing controversy over "selective" action against Rahul Gandhi and others for posting photographs of Mr Gandhi speaking with the family of the nine-year-old Dalit girl who was allegedly raped and killed in Delhi last week.

Today morning Instagram shared a screenshot of the Congress' account with a message from Twitter that said it had been locked because it "violated Twitter rules" regarding publishing or posting other people's private information without their express authorisation and permission".

The posts read, "Modiji, just how afraid are you? Reminder: The Congress party fought for our nation's independence, equipped only with truth, non-violence & the will of the people. We won then, we'll win again," the Congress said.

Twitter said its rules are "enforced judiciously and impartially for everyone", and that it took "proactive action on several hundred tweets that posted an image that violated our Rules".

Twitter said it was alerted by the NCPCR (National Commission for Protection of Child Rights), "about specific content on our platform that allegedly revealed the identity of an alleged sexual assault victim's (and a minor's) parents".

"We reviewed it against Twitter Rules and policies, as well as the concerns expressed as a matter of the Indian law..." a Twitter spokesperson said, adding, "... If a tweet is found to be in violation of the Twitter Rules, and has yet to be deleted by the account holder, we hide it behind a notice and the account remains locked until the tweet is removed or the appeal is successfully processed."

According to Twitter, a 'locked' account means the user cannot tweet and "can only send Direct Messages to followers". The user "will not be able to engage in actions such as tweeting, retweeting, or liking, and only followers can see past tweets."

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said, "I have taken a firm stand on this and am actively engaged to restore the accounts. It is a sad reflection... the way the BJP is trying to undermine the opposition,"

(With inputs from PTI)