‘Block PM Modi’ is trending on Twitter

Following the unsavoury controversy swirling around Prime Minister Narendra Modi, wherein it was suggested that he was following accounts which had posted vicious and abusive messages celebrating or justifying the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, the BJP on Thursday clarified that "Mr Modi has never blocked or unfollowed anyone on Twitter" and his following someone is "not a character certificate."

Since Wednesday, a section of social media has been outraged over those tweets and the fact that they did not result in the PM unfollowing the people who posted them. #BlockNarendraModi was a trending topic on twitter on Thursday.

“It takes PM no time to tweet about Gajendra Singh or Nitish Kumar resigning, but he continues to follow the bigot who called Gauri Lankesh 'kuttiya' tweeted Prateek Sinha, the founder of Alt News, a factchecking website/media watchdog. Sinha was not the only one angry about the PM's deafening silence with others voicing a similar sentiment in the social media.

Clearly on the defensive, the BJP's IT cell said in a statement: The PM's tracking of certain accounts "is not in any way a guarantee of how a person would conduct himself." The party’s IT head Amit Malviya claimed that Mr Modi is the ‘only leader’ who openly engages with people on social media. Malviya also went on to say that PM Modi is the ‘rare leader’ who believes in the

PM Modi following someone is not a character certificate for that person: BJP

Continued from page 1 freedom of expression and has never blocked or unfollowed anyone on Twitter.

Referring to opposition leaders followed by PM Modi, Malviya claimed that the prime minister follows Rahul Gandhi even though he is ‘an accused in loot and fraud’. Training his guns on Delhi CM Kejriwal, Malviya said, “PM also follows Arvind Kejriwal who abused him on Twitter and told a woman ‘settle kar lo’ when she complained of a party member who had molested her”.

Hours after Lankesh, a harsh critic of right-wing ideology, was shot dead at her home in Bengaluru, some Twitter users, who claimed proximity to BJP leaders, made offensive remarks about her shooting.

Twitter user Nikhil Dadich (@nikhildadhich), who is still followed by the PM, had used cuss words with reference to her - the post was later deleted. Ashish Mishra (@aashish81us), who was followed by IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, tweeted that Lankesh deserved to die. The minister later described the posts as "deplorable" and said "I strongly condemn them." He no longer follows Mishra.

Incidentally, PM Modi has not addressed a large televised gathering for almost two years. Some people attribute it to his love-hate relationship with the English speaking press since his days as Gujarat Chief Minister.