Amritsar-The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) has sent a legal notice to X (formerly Twitter), initiating action against the social media platform over a fake/parody X account of the Sikh organisation. This legal notice has been sent by Advocate Amanbir Singh Siali, the legal advisor of the organization as per the decision of SGPC’s executive meeting held on November 20, 2023.
Advocate Siali has stated in his notice that spreading and encouraging hate propaganda against any religion or religious organization by social media platforms like X under the policy of parody accounts is a violation of the Indian Penal Code, Information Technology Act 2001 and Information Technology Rules 2021. He said that this phenomenon is being done to hurt the religious feelings and faith of Sikhs. With this hate campaign, mutual brotherhood is also being threatened in the society, so it should be stopped immediately, otherwise the SGPC will not hesitate to take legal action at all levels.
Giving information about this notice, SGPC secretary Partap Singh said that the matter was raised to X social media platform when a fake/parody X account of SGPC, the constitutional body of Sikhs, came to light, but in the written communication, X refused to stop it. In a follow-up communication, X/Twitter described the parody account as part of its policy, after which the executive meeting presided over by SGPC President Harjinder Singh Dhami approved legal action.
The SGPC secretary said that on this fake/parody account, hate propaganda is being spread against the Sikh organization SGPC and the Sikh community, which cannot be tolerated. He said that tarnishing the image of the constitutional body of Sikhs through this social media account is not appropriate in any way. He said that the SGPC has written to the Union and State governments several times to take action against such social media platforms, but this hate campaign continues unabated. He also said that it is the duty of the governments to stop pre-planned hate propaganda against any religion but no adequate steps are being taken to stop it. He said that action should be taken against the people who spread conspiratorial propaganda against the SGPC and Sikhs.
Notably, the official X/Twitter handle of SGPC is @SGPCAmritsar, while mischievous people have created a fake/parody account @SGPCAmritsar_ and are continuously posting hateful posts against the organization and Sikh community. The religious symbols included in the official logo of SGPC have also been tampered with on this handle.