Communist Party of India (Marxist) has termed the recent order of Government directing employees to refrain from using social media networking sites as dictatorial and has asked the State regime to withdraw this order without any delay."The Tuesday's order issued by the state government imposing extensive restrictions on the use of social media by its employees exposes the dictatorial and regressive mindset of the coalition BJP-PDP government,” Senior CPI(M) leader Muhammad Yousuf Tarigami said. “At a time when the government is claiming remarkable success in bringing the state, back on the tracks of normalcy; restricting the use of social media, not only belies its tall claims, it has also the negative potential to further alienate a substantial proportion of the masses. Going by its own claim of improvement in the situation, the government should have initiated the process of withdrawing draconian laws like AFSPA, PSA etc already in place. Unfortunately it chose to curtail the freedom of expression of its nearly half a million employees.”Tarigami said that the measure is highly undemocratic and arbitrary. “In a democracy, the employees are not serfs and should not be required to ask for guidelines as to what and how they want to express themselves even on the social networking. The government order under reference has many vague and inexplicable terms like "prejudicial to the government."Such terms could be interpreted to the disadvantage of the employees and empower the government. to silence them". Muhammad Yousuf Tarigami said the government must reconsider its decision and withdraw this authoritarian measure in order to avoid unrest in the ranks of its employees. (CNS)