Days after police visited their offices in New Delhi, Twitter Inc. has said it is concerned about the safety of its employees in India, The BBC reported on Friday.
The social network called the visit by a team of Delhi Police's Special Cell as a form of intimidation in its first public comments on the matter.
Twitter reiterated its commitment to India as an important market, but indicated its growing unease about the government's recent actions and potential threats to freedom of expression that may result.
The police served a notice to the U.S. company over its failure to remove a "manipulated media" label it had placed on a tweet by the ruling party's representative.
"We, alongside many in civil society in India and around the world, have concerns with regards the use of intimidation tactics by the police in response to enforcement of our global Terms of Service," The Independent quoted a Twitter representative as saying.
India has said Twitter must obey the law. Friction between the government and media companies have escalated over new policies for digital content.
Since March last year, Twitter employees have been working from home and the majority of its global offices, including in India, have been closed ever since.
Twitter also rejected "core elements" of new IT policies that were enforced Wednesday and which have prompted WhatsApp to file a legal action against the Indian government.
The Indian government and the Delhi Police issued separate statements to counter Twitter's claims.
The IT ministry called Twitter's statement as "totally baseless, false and an attempt to defame India to hide their own follies," while the police said it was aimed at impeding a lawful inquiry.
Twitter has been at loggerheads with the Indian government since February after the IT officials asked it to block content that accuse Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration was trying to silence criticism in connection to farmer protests in the country.
