Published on 02:10 PM, February 20, 2016

Facebook blocks Suman after JNU row song

Indian former Trinamool Congress MP Kabir Suman on Friday claimed he was blocked by Facebook after he had posted a song that he had written in support of the JNU agitation, reports The Indian Express on Saturday. Photo grabbed from the singer's Facebook profile

Indian former Trinamool Congress MP Kabir Suman on Friday claimed he was blocked by Facebook after he had posted a song that he had written in support of the JNU agitation, reports The Indian Express today.
Suman had also posted the lyrics of a song, condemning parliament attack and the way convict Afzal Guru was hanged. A former journalist and renowned songwriter and singer, Suman had won the 2009 Lok Sabha elections on a Trinamool ticket, defeating CPM's Sujan Chakraborty from Jadavpur in Kolkata, it said.
"I had written a song in support of JNU. It was on the lines of 'I am with you JNU'. It was just a couple of lines. A few days ago, I had posted the lyrics… In 2014, I had written another song about the way Afzal Guru was hanged. I had never decided on the tune… it was just words. I had posted this as well," The Indian Express reports quoting Suman.
"When I logged into Facebook the day before yesterday, I found that the posts have been removed. A notification from Facebook said what I had uploaded was not in keeping with its guidelines and thus, I have been blocked for 19 hours," he added.

Barely six months ago, Suman had been abused for having praised the Bangladeshi cricket team on Facebook. "The happy Hindus and the so-called Bengali intelligentsia had posted abuses. It was nothing… I am used to such kind of behaviour from the Hindus here. But then, Facebook had done nothing about those posts. Were those posts in keeping with what Facebook found acceptable?" Suman asked.
Suman, who was originally Suman Chattopadhyay, had converted to Islam to marry Bangladeshi singer Sabina Yasmin.
"What is happening in the country right now is simply high-handed fascism. Everyone knows that Kanhaiya Kumar (JNU student leader arrested for sedition) did not make anti-national statements. I was watching a video today, which showed that the footage that was used as evidence was actually doctored," he said.
"Besides, what is national and what is anti-national? By that logic, I too am anti-national. I believe that India should have granted plebiscite to the Kashmiri people… By not doing so, the country has behaved in an unconstitutional and undemocratic manner… It was clearly a breach of trust," said Suman.
On Guru, he said: "I believe Afzal Guru was a terrorist and he should have been executed in a proper manner. But what did India do… he was hung in secret. They did not even let him meet his family before he died, which was his right. His body was also not handed over to his family. What kind of a democracy is this?"
"Nobody cares that Irom Sharmila has been on a hunger strike for the last 15 years. I don't believe a word that any minister says in the government. I believe the entire JNU episode has been staged to divert people's attention from Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula's suicide," he added.