Tesla Founder & X boss (formerly known as Twitter), Elon Musk on Wednesday was slammed by SGPC over the ongoing farmers protest 2024 in India. The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) reacted to Elon Musk's post which boasted X as the only platform promoting free speech. While Musk has always maintained that X is totally supports free speech irrespective of the viewers' political inclination, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee outlined how the social media platform is not supporting when it comes to the Delhi Chalo march or Farmers Protest 2024.
Reacting to Elon Musk's post, SGPC wrote, "You failed to stop and check hate speech and false propaganda under the garb of 'freedom of speech' besides protecting the handles of farmer activists expressing legitimate dissent, distinguishing feature of democracy, during ongoing #FarmersProtest2024."
For the unversed, SGPC is an apex Gurudwara body that is responsible for the management of Gurdwaras, Sikh places of worship in states of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh and the union territory of Chandigarh. SGPC also administers Darbar Sahib in Amritsar.
Notably, it is not the first time SGPC and X have come at loggerheads. In January this year, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) sent a legal notice to X (formerly Twitter), initiating action against the social media platform over a fake/ parody account of the gurdwara body. In response, X (Twitter) suspended a fake/parody handle @SGPCAmritsar_ operating in the name of Sikh organization SGPC.
Farmers Protest 2.0
Over 10,000 farmers are marching to Delhi to protest against the Modi Government over their multiple demands that include a legal guarantee on MSP, India's exit from WTO, etc. The Delhi Chalo protest was initiated on Tuesday when a meeting between farmer unions and a delegation of the Central Government remained inconclusive. Haryana and New Delhi imposed section 144 to avoid any untoward incidents that occurred during the farmers' protests in 2020-21. To stop the farmers from marching to Delhi, the Haryana Government used barb wires, cement barricades, and many more things. Also, heavy security forces and Police officials were deployed in multiple districts to stop the farmers marching to New Delhi. As a result, a scuffle broke out between the farmers and the Police. The Police fired tear gas and pellet guns to disperse thousands of protesters marching to the national capital.