In what comes as another ambitious feather to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's promised 'Make-in-India' campaign, a new desi social networking app called 'Koo' is all decked up to take on its obvious competitor, Twitter.
To provide a boost to its initial membership, even union ministers were seen on this day promoting the app with promises of "exciting and exclusive updates".
"I am now on Koo. Connect with me on this Indian micro-blogging platform for real-time, exciting and exclusive updates. Let us exchange our thoughts and ideas on Koo," wrote Union Minister Piyush Goyal from his official handle on Twitter.
Goyal, who holds the Railways, the Commerce and Industry, and the Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution portfolios in the central cabinet, also shared a link to his profile on 'Koo' to encourage his followers to get the latest updates there.
Netizens were seen viewing the 'Koo' app as more or less a Twitter ripoff with most of the latter's features intact, much unlike another desi competitor, Tooter, which was all the talk in the town a while ago.
You check out more about that "swadeshi" social media platform here:
In
For its part though, 'Koo' promises to be the 'Voice of India' as it supports multiple Indian languages.
The app description reads, "Just 10% of India speaks English. Almost 1 billion people in India don't know English. Instead they speak one of India's 100s of languages. They are now getting access to smartphones and would love an internet in their language. However, majority of the internet has been in English. Koo is an attempt to make the voice of these Indians heard. They can now participate on the internet in their mother tongue by listening to the views of some of the sharpest Indian minds and also speak their mind by sharing their thoughts."
The app was launched 10 months ago and won the Aatmanirbhar App Challenge organised by the Indian government itself under the Made-In-India initiative in August 2020.
Besides the Railway Ministry, the Union Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) and some other government departments have also set up accounts on the native micro-blogging website.
Koo said it has so far verified handles of MeitY, MyGov, Digital India, India Post, National Informatics Centre (NIC), National Institute of Electronics and Information Technology (NIELIT), Common Services Centre, UMANG app, Digi Locker, National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI), Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC), among others, on its platform.
The Railway Ministry is the latest addition to that list.
Why is India looking for Twitter's desi alternative?
The move comes as a strategic response as an action against Twitter for not complying with the order for blocking around 257 Tweets and Twitter accounts which were tweeting about farmer genocide.
In a strongly-worded notice to Twitter, MeitY last week said it had on January 31 asked the micro-blogging site to block 257 URLs (web addresses) and one hashtag under the relevant provision of the law as they were "spreading misinformation about (farmer) protests and has the potential to lead to imminent violence affecting public order situation in the country."
Twitter chose to sit over the request for one full day before blocking them, only to unblock them a few hours later. This was not taken kindly by the government and a fresh order/notice has been issued to Twitter for compliance, failing which penal action under sections that provide for fine and jail up to 7 years can be initiated.
According to Twitter, it held meetings with government officials and conveyed that the accounts and posts in question constitute free speech and are newsworthy. The company then "unwithheld" the accounts to protect public conversation. The other accounts that were initially withheld included those of CPM politician Mohd Salim, farm organisation BKU Ekta Ugrahan and Tractor2Twitter.
"We believe that it is important to build social networks keeping in mind local cultural nuances. Koo being deeply focussed on India will help ensure a consistent experience for all users on the platform.
"We are humbled and at the same time excited by the adoption and encouragement by so many noteworthy personalities and recently the entry of the top most government offices of the country onto Koo," its co-founder and CEO Aprameya Radhakrishna.
The company also claimed it has seen a surge in downloads after MeitY joined its platform.
