Social media platforms like Facebook and WhatsApp have well laid out policies on posting their contents just as print and electronic media are bound by rules and regulations. The Facebook had a few years back published internal editorial guidelines to rebut accusations that it was politically biased in showing news content on its pages. Shockingly, such policies are honoured more in breach than in observance. Social media is several notches ahead in violating own policies for promoting self-interest. The latest statistics show that WhatsApp has around 200 crore and Facebook has 130 crore users across the globe. This figure is tentatively put at 40 crores and 24 crores respectively in India. In this background of proliferation of social media users, the articles published recently in international media, especially Wall Street Journal, pinpointing how Facebook is showing favouritism towards the ruling party in India, assume great significance; any biased presentation of news content can have disastrous results.

Reports point out that Facebook is reluctant to take down posts by right-wing leaders while they do so with regard to posts by those who oppose the present regime and its core supporters. To substantiate this charge, the Wall Street Journal referred to BJP’s Telangana MLA T. Raja Singh whose posts have not been removed from Facebook despite its controversial content denigrating Muslims. Despite BJP coming out all guns blazing against the report, the newspaper has been vindicated, though quite late, as the Facebook has now banned the MLA from its platform for violating its policy on content promoting violence and hate. Earlier, the Facebook complicated the issue by the reported statement of its Public Policy Director in India who had told her colleagues that “punishing violations by politicians from Mr Modi’s party would affect the company’s business prospects in the country.” If proved true, such partisan approach in monitoring the content on social media platforms is outrageous to say the least.

The media exposures on Facebook have shown that some of its news content could affect the religious and social harmony in the country. The Congress has termed it ‘brazen assault’ on democracy and peaceful co-existence of people. In a related development, the Delhi Assembly’s Peace and Harmony Committee has decided to summon Facebook officials on hate content in its posts. The committee has received several complaints against the officials of Facebook for their allegedly deliberate inaction to contain hateful content. It seems to be an afterthought that the Modi government too is trying to turn the tables on Facebook. In a letter to Mark Zuckerberg, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad stated that the social media platform is against those who have right-of-centre ideology.

Any unholy nexus between the government of the largest democracy and the biggest social media platform can lead to dangerous situations. It can swing public opinion in favour of the “one who pays the piper”. Social media platforms should not be weighed down by business interests; rather they have a social commitment to not harm the harmony prevailing in a country. Hence a thorough investigation is needed to find out whether such platforms are being misused for posting biased news content. They cannot be allowed to go scot-free if they allow certain preferred ‘clients’ to indulge in hate-mongering, thereby putting the nation’s future in peril.

(Published on 07th September 2020, Volume XXXII, Issue 37)