In the midst of a battle with the government, Twitter has appointed Global Legal Policy Director Jeremy Kessel as the grievance officer for India to follow the centre's new rules for social networking websites, NDTV.com reported. The new rules, however, require an Indian resident for the role.

This comes a day after the social media giant's interim grievance redressal officer in the country, appointed less than a month ago, resigned amid the firm's prolonged feud with the government.

Twitter had told the Delhi High Court on May 31 it was appointing Dharmendra Chatur, partner at a law firm that represented Twitter, as the interim officer for the role.

But the centre said it could not accept the appointment of outsiders to statutory posts, as a result of which Chatur resigned on Sunday.

With the new rules or the so-called Intermediary Guidelines, the government aims to regulate content on social media websites that have more than 50 lakh users such as Facebook and Twitter, making them more accountable for the content. The guidelines include appointing India-based compliance executives and other conditions.

Critics have raised concerns that Twitter may no longer enjoy protection against user-generated content.