Tweeting a contradiction

The leading article in today’s Economic Times starts like this “India seeks to arm itself with the power to block Twitter and other social networking sites and regions, but it may find it difficult to do so as telecom companies and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) say this is technologically unfeasible and exorbitantly expensive”

It is clear that the Indian Government and politicians are beautifully orchestrating a contradiction, by using the recent communal tensions in Assam. To use the foul language of non-producers and looters, their speeches will undoubtedly go like this “In these difficult times, the Indian Government has made the difficult decision to block social media in all the important states, for matters of internal security and running a democratic nation.” The underscored meaning of that line will be that the Government knows its power and seeks to expand and use the same.

It is the thought of blocking media that’s absolutely baffling. How can the top Government officials utter such a contradiction without batting an eyelid? No clue indeed!

What the Government should rather do is to get off their bums and actually make an effort to learn and use social media effectively, rather than blocking and condemning a form of expression that they cannot understand.

But the article goes on to say that internet providers and the telecom operators have said they only have the capability to block websites and social networking sites on a national basis. Well, that’s a relief. Because if the Indian Government still goes on to say that they would block, at least they would have expressed outright their intentions to join its Chinese counterpart with open arms.