Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah files complaint with Meta over faulty Kannada translation

In Karnataka, CM Siddaramaiah and even his predecessors post messages in Kannada on social media platforms to reach out to the citizens about the government's welfare schemes.

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Thursday (July 17), through his media advisor, filed a formal complaint with Meta over faulty translation issues detected ON Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp Messenger platforms.

CM Siddaramaiah and even his predecessors regularly post messages in Kannada on social media to reach out to citizens.

However, social media platforms, which are run by multinational companies like Meta, though offer local language auto-translation to English, are not able to accurately make word-by-word literal translations and cause confusion among users.

In a similar instance, CM Siddaramaiah has faced faulty auto-translation issues in one of the platforms run by Meta and his message in Kannada was wrongly interpreted in English.

The CM did not mention specific details about the incident. But, we have come across a recent post related to the death of Kannada veteran actress B Sarojadevi.

A faulty translation feature on Meta's Facebook presented a grossly inaccurate interpretation of Karnataka CM's Kannada message in English.

The mortal remains of the actress was kept in her residence in Malleswara for the public to pay their last respects and the CM too visited there.

The official Karnataka CM handle shared the photos and said-- "CM Siddaramaiah paid floral tribute to multi-lingual actress B Sarojadevi".

However, the auto-translation presented a grossly inaccurate translation and some ill-informed people on the social media platforms accused the CM of negligence.

On Thursday, through his media advisor K V Prabhakar, the Chief Minister has filed a complaint and requested to fix the issue as early as possible. And, also urged the citizens to be careful and double-check the translated messages on Meta.

"Faulty auto-translation of Kannada content on Meta platforms is distorting facts & misleading users. This is especially dangerous when it comes to official communications. Social media platforms must act responsibly. I caution citizens to be aware that translations shown are often inaccurate. Such negligence by tech giants can harm public understanding & trust," said CM Siddaramaiah while posting a picture of his mail on X.

In the email, the CM's media adviser has urged Meta officials to collaborate with local language experts to improve auto-translation.

The CM has also asked Meta to suspend the auto-translator option on Meta platforms until the issue has been rectified.

DH has reached out Meta for an official response. We will update this section as soon as they revert back.

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