Lok Sabha polls: Elon Musk-owned X withholds some political posts after EC's takedown order

Social media platform X on Tuesday said it has withheld some posts in India that contained political speech from elected politicians, political parties, and candidates for office after the Election Commission of India issued specific takedown orders. 

The social platform said it disagreed with the election commission's orders.

"The Election Commission of India has issued takedown orders requiring X to act on posts containing political speech shared from elected politicians, political parties and candidates for office. In compliance with the orders, we have withheld these posts for the remainder of the election period; however, we disagree with these actions and maintain that freedom of expression should extend to these posts and political speech in general," the platform said in a post on X (formerly Twitter).

It added: "We have notified the affected users and in the interest of transparency, we are publishing the takedown orders here. We call on the Election Commission to publish all of its takedown orders going forward."

The Election Commission of India will hold the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in 7 phases, beginning from April 19 and ending on June 1. The results will be declared on June 4. 

Besides, the assembly polls for Andhra Pradesh will be on May 13, Sikkim on April 19, Arunachal Pradesh on April 19, and Odisha will be held on May 13. 

Last month, ECI declared that around 97 crore people are eligible to vote in the upcoming polls. Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar said that voters older than 85 years of age will be allowed to vote from home. 

He also said that minimum basic facilities like drinking water and toilets will be made available at all polling booths. The tenure of the present Lok Sabha ends on June 16 and a new House will have to be constituted before that. The tenure of the four state assemblies will also end in June.