Twitter cites 'inactivity' for removal of blue tick from RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat’s account, later restores it

Hours after the microblogging site, Twitter removed blue tick from India’s Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) Chief Mohan Bhagwat’s account, it declined to comment on the controversy erupted over the issue.

Replying to the queries sent by NH, Twitter India said it does not have any comment to offer at this time.

“Should there be an update on this, we will reach out to you,” said Twitter India in its response.

Later the news agency PTI quoted Twitter as saying that the blue badge and verified status could be automatically removed from an account if it is incomplete or inactive for six months as per its rules.

A major controversy erupted on the microblogging site on Saturday when, in a sudden move, Twitter removed blue tick from Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu and RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat’s account among others.

Although, blue tick to Naidu’s account was restored within an hour, Mohan Bhagwat’s account remained “unverified” for a few hours then it was also restored.

There was a huge uproar on the site over the issue, people belonging to the right-wing, demanded restoration of blue tick to Bhagwat’s account immediately. While some threatened to boycott Twitter, some questioned Twitter’s neutrality. Interestingly, #BanTwitterIndia remained one of the top trending hashtags on Twitter itself.

“We have taken cognizance of the matter and are looking into it,” an RSS spokesperson said.

It is important to mention here that Bhagwat’s handle has 209k followers, but he has not tweeted anything since he joined it in 2019.

As per RSS insiders, Bhagwat’s account remained inactive because there are established channels of communication in the Sangh set-up.

“The account was sought to be verified earlier as there are multiple fake accounts in the name of Bhagwat ji on Twitter. We wanted to make sure that statements issued through those accounts are not mistaken as official statements from him,” an RSS office-bearer was quoted as saying by the Indian Express.

A section of political watchers, however, believe that the development is a result of the ongoing tussle between the Government of India and Twitter – one of the largest corporations of the world over new IT rules. Delhi HC, while hearing a petition last week directed social media intermediaries to follow the new IT rules.

Twitter India, meanwhile, indicated that the blue tick had gotten removed from the personal account of the Vice- President because his account remained inactive since July last year.

An official statement from the platform is awaited.

Naidu’s Twitter handle – @MVenkaiahNaidu – has 1.3 million followers. The last tweet from his account was on July 23, 2020, which shows the vice-president is not active on his personal account since then.