Akhilesh Yadav questioned why Facebook suspended his account after it flagged his posts about a journalist’s death and a woman’s suspicious death in Ballia as “Adult Sexual Exploitation and Violence.” Facebook later restored his account.
Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh): Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav questioned the suspension of his Facebook account on Saturday, alleging that his posts regarding the death of a journalist and another on the suspicious death of a woman in Ballia were incorrectly flagged as “Adult Sexual Exploitation and Violence”.
Earlier today, the Facebook account of the SP Chief was restored.
SP Chief Akhilesh Yadav on Facebook account suspension
“I got to know later on that my account has been suspended because there were some objections. I was told that the objection was ‘Adult Sexual Exploitation and Violence’. When I got the entire report, there were posts regarding a woman from Ballia, and there were posts regarding the murder of a journalist”, Akhilesh told the media.
Claiming that he was highlighting the pressure put on journalists by the BJP, Akhilesh Yadav said, “In the post I had written, that the death of a journalist, putting pressure on them…doing FIRs on them and putting undue pressure on them, all of the BJP’s tricks are being used here.”
Questioning his account suspension, he reaffirmed his commitment to working on the ground and engaging with people in person to empower them, rather than solely relying on social media.
“What was wrong with this? But we have understood that the more we work on the ground, our fight will become successful and that is why we will work on the ground itself, and do the work of enlightening the people”, he said.
Information Technology on why Facebook suspended SP chief’s account
Earlier, Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw, said that the Central government “had no role” in the account suspension.
“Facebook has taken action; the government has no role in this. There was a very abusive post on their account, which is why Facebook suspended the account according to their policy. There is no role of the government here”, Vaishnaw told reporters while visiting the New Delhi Railway Station today.
Earlier today Samajwadi Party alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party is suppressing the opposition’s voice.
Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Fakhrul Hasan Chaand shared a post on X, stating that the suspension of Yadav’s account is an attack on democracy.
National Secretary of Samajwadi Party, Rajeev Rai, also condemned this act, saying it’s a blow to India’s democratic system.
Rai’s X post read, “Blocking the account of the leader of the third largest party in the country’s parliament, the former Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, @yadavakhilesh ji, by FACEBOOK is not only condemnable but also a blow to India’s democratic system.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by Asianet Newsable English staff and is published from a syndicated feed)