Facebook responds to Congress’ concerns about interference in India’s affairs; promises corrective measures

A few days after the Congress shot off two letters to the Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg regarding the social media platform’s India team leadership showing political bias towards the ruling BJP, the Facebook has responded acknolwledging the issue and has promised to take corrective action.

In a statement released by Praveen Chakravarty, Chairman, AICC Data Analytics, the party noted the response from Facebook Inc and their wish to be non-partisan and non-interfering in India’s affairs.

Facebook has also expressed their desire to continue to engage with the Congress party on these matters, the statement said.

The Congress party wrote a letter to Facebook Inc. in Menlo Park, USA, on August 18, expressing concern and asking them to acknowledge the issue of personal political bias of Facebook India team leadership influencing India’s harmony and democracy and take corrective action.

The Congress took this action when a credible and reputed international publication Wall Street Journal had made significant revelations about the dubious conduct of Facebook and WhatsApp India’s leadership team and how personal biases and proximity of Facebook and WhatsApp India leadership team with the ruling BJP spilled over to their professional endeavours and used the near monopoly power of their platforms to influence and interfere in India’s electoral democracy and social harmony.

Highlighting the fact that this issue was not just a political one but a serious social one too, Praveen Chakravarty further said in the statement that “this is not a political issue. This is about India’s democracy and use of digital weapons to disrupt India’s social order by a foreign company, at the behest of certain individuals in their leadership team.”

Responding to the reply by Facebook, the statement further read, “the Congress party will await further concrete action from the global leadership of Facebook and demonstration of specific corrective measures being undertaken in Facebook & WhatsApp India. It must be reiterated that the media revelations on this issue were based on solid documentary evidence of internal communication and are hence incontrovertible.”