AICC's social and digital media head Divya Spandana has hit out at BJP's Amit Malviya for "his rabid and sinister response justifying PM Narendra Modi following trolls celebrating the murder of Gauri Lankesh."
Amit, who is the National Head - Information & Technology of the party, on Thursday released a statement which said that the controversy over the PM following people on Twitter is "mischievous and contorted.”
"PM following someone is not a character certificate of a person and is not in any way a guarantee of how a person would conduct himself. However, PM also follows Rahul Gandhi (Congress Vice President), who is an accused in loot and fraud. PM also follows Arvind Kejriwal (Delhi Chief Minister), who abused him on Twitter and told a woman 'settle kar lo' when she complained of a party member molesting her," he said.
The controversy over PM following people on Twitter is mischievous and contorted: Shri @malviyamit, National Head - Information & Technology pic.twitter.com/8Ss6fgCOj2
— BJP (@BJP4India) September 7, 2017
Divya, who is also a former MP, called out the BJP IT head's response saying, "BJP Social Media Head, Amit Malviya's rabid and sinister response justifying PM Narendra Modi following trolls celebrating the murder of Gauri Lankesh has exposed the fanatical and dangerous agenda of the BJP Govt and the party."
"May we remind PM Modi and BJP that it is this very thought that led to assassination of Mahatma Gandhi by Godse with RSS distributing sweets and celebrating the murder of 'Father of the Nation'. And don't forget that it is for this very reason that Sardar Patel, India's Home Minister, banned the RSS," she said.
She also added, "Same culture of hate, abuse, division and murder is being propagated today. On behalf of all our countrymen, we assure the hate mongers that they failed yesterday and they will fail today. We will determinedly continue this fight despite PM Modi's conspiratorial silence."
Hours after journalist Gauri Lankesh was shot dead in Bengaluru on Tuesday, Twitter user Nikhil Dadhich put out a rabid tweet celebrating the horrific murder.
Roughly translated, his tweet said the journalist died a dog's death and all the sympathisers (referred to as 'puppies' in the tweet) are mewling.
His Twitter bio, at that point, stated that he is a "businessman", "Hindu Nationalist" and feels "Honoured To Be Followed By PM Sh. @narendramodi Ji".
Following sharp criticism, Nikhil deleted his tweet and has also changed his bio which now reads "Hindu Nationalist".
Nikhil however was not the only one spewing hate on social media, with many users even justifying the killing.
In response to the hate, #BlockNarendraModi began trending on Twitter with the hashtag being the top trend with over 24,000 tweets on Thursday.