When you were in school and during your Geography lectures, your teacher asked you to pinpoint all the states and union territories in India and, if by chance, you erred, chances were- not only were you slapped in front of the classroom- if he or she was too strict- but you were also shown the door. Only a teacher with soft heart would pardon you and help you understand the details. But tell you what, real life is no classroom drama; it is a venue of the real where mistakes like that can be a tad bit costly. For instance, take the Twitter MD Manish Maheshwari for an example. Over the matter of a wrong map of India, Mr. Manish Maheshwari has been booked by the UP Police and now faces a legal hassle.
So the question is, what exactly happened and how did things take a turn for the worse?
Earlier, in 2021, as it turns out, a controversial map of India had appeared over Twitter, which had caused some controversy. Reportedly, this particular map, that created much storm over the popular social networking site had happened to show Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh as being separate countries. They weren’t shown as being integral part of India. This particular instance happened to trigger heavy censorship on the part of the netizens.
And while it is not known to what extent was an apology issued by Twitter and if there’s been any, has been accepted, things have taken a sour turn since then.
Resultantly, Twitter India MD Mr. Manish Maheshwari has been booked by the UP Police, who have not pardoned the senior executive for an act that’s not only generated whirlwind furore but also drawn ire from different corners.
That said, it must be asked- if Mr. Manish Maheshwari would ever have imagined that such a day would come when an erroneous map would lead to such a drastic counter action?
Moving on, here is what the Hindustan Times happened to report on one of the most interesting albeit eye-opening pieces of development from the land of one of the world’s largest democracies:
Along with Maheshwari, one Amrita Tripathi has also been booked under section 505(2) of the IPC — statement conducing to public mischief — and section 74 of the IT (Amendment) Act, 2008. Bulandshahr senior superintendent of police (SSP) Santosh Kumar Singh confirmed that a lawyer Praveen Bhati has lodged an FIR against officials of Twitter India for showing the incorrect map of India.
The case relates to the controversial map of India which earlier appeared on the career section of the Twitter website under the header ‘Tweep Life’. It was revealed earlier last weekend that the map actually showed Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, as a separate country. After the distorted map came under public scrutiny last weekend, it triggered a heavy censuring from netizens, and even though Twitter got rid of the contentious map on late Monday night, demands of strict action against the microblogging platform were raised.
As a matter of fact, of late, the life and times of Twitter in India haven’t been replete with all that happiness with the popular micro-blogging platform falling off with the Central Government on the matter of compliance with the new set of rules laid out by the IT sector in the country. And now this shaky development!