New Policy for Social Media

BTRC, Bangladesh’s telecommunications controller, has released a draft of a new policy for social media and OTT platforms, including Facebook and YouTube. The proposed policy has raised enterprises among druggies.

The BTRC said the policy was drafted on the instructions of the High Court to regulate the conditioning of social media and online platforms. Still, numerous have expressed concern about the policy, saying it would further circumscribe mortal freedom of expression. Because there’s no specific description of the crime, law enforcement can abuse it.

Still, Telecommunications Minister Mustafa Jabbar said the policy was being publicized. The policy wasn’t initiated by BTRC or the Ministry of Information on its own action. The High Court has asked them to do so. Responding to a question on whether the delineations of crime are veritably broad and whether it can be misemployed by colorful interpretations, the minister said that the description of crime has to be kept broad in order to bring a new subject under the law.

The policy proposes a number of rules for online platforms and their druggies. It would be a crime to publish or post any comment or news against the independence and sovereignty of the country. President Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the author of independent Bangladesh, can not be disrespected. Nothing can be done that destroys collaborative harmony. Commentary that blemishes the image of the state and can damage relations with friendly countries can not be circulated through social media.

Kazi Mahfuzul Haque Supan, Associate Professor, Department of Law, Dhaka University, while reviewing the draft policy, said that the description of crime has been kept vague and thus there’s the compass for misutilization. The big problem then (in the draft policy) is that what’s being called a crime isn’t well defined. It’s fussing. With an illustration, he said, the principle of discipline in felonious proceedings is, I’ve to understand why I’m not allowed to do any work. But the policy prohibits certain effects, the compass of which is so wide that indeed if an act isn’t a crime, for the time being, the administrative branch may consider it a crime. The way we have seen digital law being misemployed.

Numerous attorneys also feel that since the description of banned particulars has been kept vague in the draft policy, it isn’t clear to the druggies what can be done or not done through social media. As a result, fear will work on them at every moment. Supreme Court counsel said. Shahin Malik thinks that the possibility of particular sequestration being hovered is also working.

Still, also the freedom of expression and our right to sequestration will be elided If this regulation is eventually approved. Because of the way banned statements are defined in this draft regulation, numerous effects can fall under it.

Some rules have also been proposed in the draft policy on the use of messaging service apps like WhatsApp. For illustration, if a bad situation arises in the country due to a statement or post of someone on messaging apps and social media, also the situation will be created grounded on the post of the person or the first person who made the statement or post, the applicable platform has to reveal the identity of that person. Kazi Mahfuzul Haque Supan said that indeed however there’s no similar provision now, if the government asks for information about someone, these platforms frequently give it.

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In this regard, Mustafa Jabbar said that if anyone does anything against the state or works against the state or works against the policy of the state, it isn’t allowed in the constitution and law. You’ll do detriment to the state, you’ll produce a collaborative hoot nearly with a single post — and it can not be that no one will know the malefactor. It’s a matter of revealing the identity of the malefactor. The identity of this miscreant must be revealed to those who run these platforms.