KOLKATA:Leader of the Congress party in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said on Saturday that he did not put out the controversial tweet on the death anniversary of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and that his account was hacked.
The controversial tweet was posted on Chowdhury’s official Twitter handle around 11.27am on the death anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi on Saturday. An infographic in the tweet had a statement attributed to Rajiv Gandhi. It said: “When a big tree falls, the ground shakes.”
The statement was reportedly made by Rajiv Gandhi when anti-Sikh riots broke out after the assassination of his mother, former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1984. Opposition leaders have on multiple occasions alleged that the statement was made to justify the anti-Sikh riots. The riots led nearly 3,000 people dead across the country.
“My Twitter handle was hacked. Why should I make such statements? I am going to lodge a complaint with the police in Kolkata,” Chowdhury told HT.
{{/usCountry}}“My Twitter handle was hacked. Why should I make such statements? I am going to lodge a complaint with the police in Kolkata,” Chowdhury told HT.
{{/usCountry}}The tweet was pulled down immediately and replaced by another one having a different infographic.
“A malicious campaign is propagated by those forces inimical to me. The tweet against my name in the tweeter account has nothing to do with my own observation,” he later tweeted.
On this day in 1991, Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) suicide bomber during an election rally in Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu.