Twitter appears to have censored photographs of funeral pyres captured by dead Reuters photojournalist Danish Siddiqui during the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. The tweet which appears to have been censored was tweeted on the 22nd of April.
When one clicks on any of the replies to the tweet, Twitter says that the tweet by Danish Siddiqui is unavailable.
Rajnish Sharma had accused Siddiqui of making fun of “our people’s death” and said that in the Court of God, everyone is held to account. After his tweet went viral following Siddiqui’s death, Sharma said that he was extremely anguished as he had to perform the funeral rites of his wife and father within the space of four days during the first wave.
When one clicks on the “Learn More” tag of the restricted tweet, the person is taken to the ‘Help‘ section of Twitter where explanations are provided for various labels. However, in this particular instance, it does not explain why the tweet was restricted.
On the face of it, it does appear that Twitter has censored the tweet in question. However, the explanation provided in its ‘help’ section does not adequately explain the ‘unavailable’ tag on the tweet. It could be an unintentional error that could be rectified before long.
It is not clear whether the photographs violated Twitter’s ‘sensitive imagery’ policy either. The social media platform is yet to provide an explanation for the incident.
Danish Siddiqui was killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan during clashes with Afghan forces. He was on a reporting assignment to the war ravaged country, embedded with the Afghan security forces. He was killed in Spin Boldak district, Kandahar.
Siddiqui was at the centre of the controversy during the peak of the second wave of Covid-19 in India when insensitive photographs of funeral pyres were splashed across the media. The photographs were widely criticized for being insensitive. However, he had also received international praise for the photographs.