Chennai: Is TikTok, the hugely popular 15-second lip-syncing video sharing app, leading to cultural degradation and holds the potential to disturb law and order? Well, that’s what some politicians in Tamil Nadu feel. So much so, that on Tuesday, IT Minister Manikandan promised in the Legislative Assembly to take steps to get the Chinese created app banned.
In the Assembly, Nagapattinam MLA Thamimun Ansari, who heads an Islamic outfit Manithaneya Jananayaga Katchi, raised the issue saying the college students, young women and housewives had taken to the app in a big way. “Suggestive videos are being posted on the app.
Since youngsters and students are using the app, their studies are getting affected. Many political party leaders have been seeking a ban on TikTok. Will the government take steps to ban the app that has been causing degradation of culture,” he asked. The MLA felt that the app could be used as a platform to create law and order problems as well.
Taking his complaint seriously, the Information Technology Minister immediately said the government will ascertain the origin of TikTok, contact its administrators and take steps to block it. “When the Blue Whale game was spreading, we found it was hosted from a server in America and got it blocked. Similarly, with the help of the Central Government we will try to reach TikTok and ban it,” he said.
Last month, Pattali Makkal Katchi founder S Ramadoss had demanded a ban on the app saying youngsters were engrossed in TikTok and were uploading suggestive dance. BJP state president Tamilisai Soundararajan welcomed the proposal to ban TikTok saying it was being misused to target people through memes.
However, DMK spokesperson Manushyaputran said any such move would amount to cultural policing. “How are we to decide which is obscene,” he asked while saying a debate on the mobile application would be welcome but not a ban.
