Sri Lanka restores social media platforms after 15 hours
Colombo(PTI): The Sri Lankan government on Sunday lifted the ban it had imposed on social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram after declaring a nationwide public emergency and effecting a 36-hour curfew ahead of a planned anti-government rally over the worst economic crisis in the island nation.
The services of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TokTok, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Viber, Telegram, and Facebook Messenger were restored after 15 hours, according to an official.
The services had been fully or partially blocked.
The move was aimed at preventing masses from gathering in Colombo to protest the government's failure to provide relief to the public suffering from shortages of food, essentials, fuel and medicine amidst hours-long power cuts, the Colombo Page newspaper reported.
NetBlocks, a watchdog organisation that monitors cybersecurity and the governance of the Internet, had confirmed the restriction of multiple social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Viber and YouTube in Sri Lanka after midnight on Sunday.
Earlier, NetBlocks tracked a significant decline in connectivity levels on internet provider Dialog from March 29, coinciding with the onset of the protests.
The island nation braced for country-wide protests on Sunday against the government's poor handling of the ongoing economic crisis where people currently endure long hours of power outages and scarcity of essentials. The imposition of curfew would prevent citizens from holding protests.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa issued a special gazette notification late on Friday night, declaring a public emergency in Sri Lanka with immediate effect from April 1.
The government also imposed a 36-hour curfew with effect from 6 pm Saturday to 6 am Monday (April 4).
A Sri Lankan man on Saturday alleged that his son, who is a social media activist, has been abducted by the police.
Anurudda Bandara's father said his son was taken away by someone from the north Colombo police station of Modera on Friday night.
According to the police, he was wanted to be questioned over his social media activities. On Sunday, he was released on bail.
Sri Lanka is currently experiencing its worst economic crisis in history. With long lines for fuel, cooking gas, essentials in short supply and long hours of power cuts the public has been suffering for weeks.
Rajapaksa has defended his government's actions, saying the foreign exchange crisis was not his making and the economic downturn was largely pandemic driven where the island's tourism revenue and inward remittances waning.
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Maratha quota agitation will resume from June 4, warns Manoj Jarange
Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (Maha), May 14: Activist Manoj Jarange on Tuesday warned that the Maratha quota agitation will be restarted from June 4, the day the results of the ongoing Lok Sabha elections will be out.
A rally will be organised on June 8 to press the Maratha community's demand for reservations in government jobs and admissions to educational institutes, he said.
Jarange, who has been heading the agitation since last year, garlanded a statue of Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj here to mark the 17th century ruler's birth anniversary.
"We want reservation for our kids.....We have been given ten percent reservation (under the economically backward category) which is of no use. This has been proved in the (ongoing) police recruitment," he told reporters afterwards.
"We will restart the agitation at 9 am on June 4 by holding an indefinite hunger strike. The agitation will take place peacefully," the activist said, adding that he hoped the government will deal with his demands before that.
Preparations were in full swing for the rally at Narayangad in Beed district on June 8, he said.
Asked about the impact of the Maratha agitation on the Lok Sabha elections, Jarange said, "I was not involved and have not campaigned for anyone. I just said that people should defeat those who were against us."
But "never before" Prime Minister Narendra Modi had held so many campaign rallies in Maharashtra, he said.
"He had also never campaigned for different parties contesting on different symbols in the past. But this time he did that. This happened because of four or five state BJP leaders who have hatred for Marathas and other communities," Jarange said.
Among BJP leaders, deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Chandrakant Patil hate Marathas, he alleged, adding, "Fadnavis should shed this hatred as we were never against BJP."
If the government did not grant Kunbi caste certificates to the relatives of the Marathas who have obtained such a certificate, "we will be in the fray for the coming assembly polls," Jarange warned.
The agrarian Kunbi community is part of the OBC group in the state.
