Amazon Web Services (AWS) has generated a controversy because they reportedly circulated a map of India without potions of Kashmir. According to a report on DBPost.com, AWS has circulated a brochure for their Global Summit in Mumbai with a map of India that has a major part of Kashmir missing and shown in Pakistan colours.
The said image was reportedly published in the brochure sent to leading tech companies and individuals ahead of the May 10th Global Summit held in Mumbai. As per reports, about 4000 delegates were expected to attend the summit. In the image of India shared in the brochure, a chunk of Kashmir is shown missing and shown as Pakistan territory.
Many techies have objected to the imagery and an individual named Dinesh O Bareja has started an online campaign demanding Amazon to take the imagery down and issue a public apology.
AWS INSULTS INDIA
Now Amazon Web services is bent on insulting us, India, by showing a wrong map of the country on their brochures for the upcoming summit in Mumbai.
An email was sent to them on May 04, 2018 pointing out the error but there is no respon…https://t.co/Vf1fD1XK1x
— Dinesh O Bareja (@bizsprite) May 9, 2018
According to the report in DBPost, an AWS spokesperson has stated that they are looking into the matter seriously and working with a team to ensure such mistakes are not repeated.
It is notable here that this is not the first time Amazon has hurt Indian sentiments. In January 2017, after a controversy over Amazon selling doormats with the Indian national flag printed on them, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had reprimanded the organisation and the organisation had apologised and withdrawn those items.
In response to EAM @SushmaSwaraj‘s tweet, @amazon writes to her, expresses regret at hurting Indian sensibilities, pulls offending item pic.twitter.com/tqRcA10CaZ
— Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) January 12, 2017
The Geospatial information regulation bill (draft) of 2016 states that illegal dissemination, publication and distribution of geospatial information of India can attract a fine up to Rs 100 crores and imprisonment up to seven years. The bill states that any organisation using geospatial data will check the data and content provided and make sure that it is well within national policies.
Recently, Amazon India faced public outrage for endorsing actress Swara Bhaskar in a campaign as the actress had been involved in many social campaigns maligning Hindus and hurting public sentiments.
Amazon Web Services is a subsidiary of global tech giant Amazon which offers cloud computing solutions.
