Twitter’s Top Executives Decline To Appear Before Indian Parliamentary Panel

Twitter Chief Executive Officer and top officials have declined to appear before the Parliamentary Committee on Information Technology that had summoned them over the issue of safeguarding citizens’ rights on social media platforms, sources in the panel told PTI.

The committee, headed by Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament Anurag Thakur, had issued a summons to Twitter via an official letter on Feb. 1. The meeting was scheduled for Feb. 7, but was later postponed to Feb. 11 to allow the Twitter CEO and senior officials more time to make themselves available.

Twitter cited “short notice of the hearing” as the reason, despite being given 10 days to travel, the sources said.

The letter sent to Twitter by the Parliamentary IT Committee on Feb. 1 clearly stated that “it may be noted that the head of the organisation has to appear before the committee”. It further said “he/she may be accompanied by another representative”.

The committee received a letter on Feb. 7 from Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s global lead for legal, policy, trust and safety, stating, “No one who engages publicly for Twitter India makes enforcement decisions with respect to our rules for content or accounts in India.”

Deputing a junior employee to represent Twitter at the Indian Parliamentary IT Committee has not gone down well with Indian lawmakers, especially since they have no decision-making authority, the letter from Gadde said.

This comes at a time there are growing concerns about safeguarding citizens’ data privacy and election interference through social media platforms.

Twitter’s conduct is being watched globally and their response is being seen with concern as India’s Parliamentary hearing is among the fourth in the world after the U.S. Congress, Singapore and European Union hearing.