Union IT and Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad shot off a scathing letter to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, alleging that the Facebook India senior management, including the managing director, belonged to a 'political belief' that has been 'defeated' in successive elections.

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Raising "serious concerns", Prasad called on the Facebook CEO to put in place country-specific community guidelines and stated that the company's outsourcing of fact checking to a third party is a "major issue".

Prasad said that Facebook India's management had concerted effort during the 2019 elections to delete pages, offer no recourse to people "supportive of right-of-centre ideology".

Citing recent reports that highlighted a senior Facebook executive had asked the team not to act against a BJP politician's communal tweets, Prasad said, "There is collusion of a group of Facebook employees with international media".

"This interference in India's political process through gossip, whispers and innuendo is condemnable," the minister wrote in the letter shared on Tuesday.

He added, "Credible reports show that Facebook India team, right from India managing director to other senior officials is dominated by people who belong to a certain political belief."

Prasad noted that Facebook has become a tool to "stoke internal divisions and social disturbances".

The minister chided the social media platform for not acting against "anarchic and radical elements" who he said accused of using the platform in recent instances to "destroy social order".

Prasad also criticised Facebook's fact-checking abilities, stating that misinformation around COVID-19 went unchecked. The minister called on the company to "respect" the diversity in India and put in place country-specific community guidelines.

Facebook did not share any responses based on the letter, until the time of publishing this article.