Twitter flags Sambit Patra’s tweet on Congress ‘toolkit’ as manipulated media

Opposition party had written to micro-blogging site, seeking action

NEW DELHI: Micro-blogging website Twitter has flagged a tweet by BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra alleging the use of a ‘toolkit’ by Congress as manipulated media.

The May 18 tweet includes pictures of a document that, according to Mr. Patra, enlists social media measures used by the Congress to hurt Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s image during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Friends look at the #CongressToolKit in extending help to the needy during the Pandemic! More of a PR exercise with the help of “Friendly Journalists” & “Influencers” than a soulful endeavour,” the tweet by Mr. Patra said.

As per Twitter’s policy, content may be labelled as ‘manipulated media’ or, in some cases, removed if the company has a reason to believe that media, or the context in which media are presented, are “significantly and deceptively altered or manipulated”.

To access such media, the company looks at whether editing has been done in a manner that fundamentally alters the content composition, shared in a deceptive manner and is likely to impact public safety or cause harm.

“…We may label tweets containing synthetic and manipulated media to help people understand the media’s authenticity and to provide additional context,” Twitter had said earlier while announcing its manipulated media policy.

The Congress, which has alleged that the documents used by Mr. Patra are fake, on Thursday wrote to Twitter to remove tweets by BJP leaders on the issue.

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