Twitter locks accounts of ANI and NDTV  

Asian News International (ANI) and New Delhi Television (NDTV) are among the prominent news channels in the country. However, it appears that Twitter has locked both of their accounts, saying that these channels have not met the minimum age criteria for operating the platform. ANI’s Editor Smita Prakash tweeted from her own account saying, “So those who follow @ANI bad news, @Twitter has locked out India’s largest news agency which has 7.6 million followers and sent this mail – under 13 years of age! Our gold tick was taken away, substituted with blue tick and now locked out.”  

Her tweet also contains a mail sent by Twitter that reads, “In order to create a Twitter account, you must be at least 13 years old. Twitter has determined that you don’t meet these age requirements, so your account has been locked and will be removed from Twitter.” There has been a huge backlash against Twitter where netizens have been questioning Twitter’s decision to remove the handles of two major Indian channels. Prakash has further demanded the restoration of ANI’s account and added that ANI would be tentatively sharing news from ANI Digital and ANI Hindi News accounts.