Need to keep social media toxic-free: Nirmala Sitharaman

Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday stressed the need to keep the social media "toxic-free" to build an intelligent and smart narrative for the country to progress fast, reported news agency PTI.

"We should be the pioneers to make that place toxic-free. It should be an engagement forum, but without bitterness, toxicity, negativity," she said, addressing the sixth Social Media Conclave, organised by an NGO -- Namaste India.

Sitharaman disagreed with the term "warriors" or "yoddhas" for those propagating government programmes on social media platforms and said she preferred to call them architects as they improved the ambience and beautified the surroundings.

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"Architects do wonderful things to make our ambience, ecosystem better. They bring in more trees. I think, as architects of the social media, we should bring in more culture in the wonderful, technology-based, interaction fora -- whether it is Instagram, WhatsApp or Facebook, and a lot more.

"We communicate better by bringing in a lot of facts. We get the reality in picture, in words...," she was quoted as saying.

Sitharaman acknowledged that there was a need for the country to move fast and in this context, said there should be an intelligent and smart narrative on the social media platforms, instead of "toxic discussions".