On January 27, Twitter replied to the allegations made by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi where he had alleged conspiracy as his followers were not increasing on the social media platform. In its reply, the Twitter spokesperson said that the social media platform has a zero-tolerance approach to platform manipulation and spam. Twitter further added that they have removed millions of accounts for violating their terms and condition.

As per news agency ANI, Twitter Spokesperson, while replying to the allegations, said, “Follower counts are a visible feature, and we want everyone to have confidence that numbers are meaningful and accurate. Twitter has a zero-tolerance approach to platform manipulation and spam.”

Twitter added that the platform fights spam and malicious automation using machine learning tools. The spokesperson said, “We fight spam and malicious automation strategically and at scale with machine learning tools, and as part of those consistent and ongoing efforts to ensure a healthy service and credible accounts, follower counts can and do fluctuate.”

Twitter further added millions of accounts are removed from the platform each week for violating Twitter’s policies regarding manipulation and spam. The spokesperson said, “We remove millions of accounts each week for violating our policies on platform manipulation and spam. You can take a look at the latest Twitter Transparency Center update for more context. While some accounts notice the minor difference, in certain cases no. could be higher.”

Rahul Gandhi’s letter to Twitter

On December 27, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had written to Parag Agrawal, CEO of Twitter, where he alleged his followers were not increasing, but the followers of other political leaders were increasing consistently. He alleged Twitter was playing a pawn in the hands of the government, and the platform was “unwittingly complicity in curbing free and fair speech in India.”

A snippet of a letter Rahul Gandhi wrote to Parag, CEO, of Twitter

Gandhi had alleged his followers count stopped increasing in July 2021, after which he received multiple communications from Twitter that a complaint was received from ‘India’ against his account. He also mentioned letters by BJP leader Vijay Jolly from Delhi where he had requested Twitter to act on the allegedly malicious tweets by Gandhi.

Rahul Gandhi has basically insinuated that his follower count not increasing means that Twitter is colluding with the government of India to ‘limit his reach’ and curb his voice. Twitter has clarified that they are committed to removing fake accounts and bots that are used to falsely amplify the social media reach of individuals.

 Prime Minister’s Office called for an urgent high-level meeting

Republic day celebrations were not even over completely when the Prime Minister’s Office called for an urgent high-level meeting as a national crisis befell upon us. In the meeting, along with PM Narendra Modi, HM Amit Shah, RM Rajnath Singh, IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, NSA Ajit Doval, R&AW Chief, IB Chief, the Cartoon Network chief was also present. The agenda of the meeting was the fact that Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter followers were stuck and not increasing.

The meeting lasted till the wee hours of the morning the next day. At around 2 AM, the PM received a call from President Kovind to enquire what necessary steps have been taken on this matter of great urgency. PM informed him that in the next parliament session they will bring an ordinance that will force every Twitter user to follow Rahul Gandhi else Mukesh Ambani will disconnect their Jio numbers. However, the President told the PM that the next parliament session is far away and asked him to pass the ordinance by today evening itself. He informed the Lok Sabha speaker to call an urgent joint session under article 78(6).

On the other hand, right-wing trolls were mocking Rahul Gandhi for crying about Twitter followers. It’s a fact that RW trolls are not aware of the importance of Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter account and what it means for the nation’s security, economy and meme industry.

In January 2020 when the world was going through massive unemployment, Rahul Gandhi hired 5 lakh Twitter warriors and these 5 lakh warriors created employment for million members. 

Rahul Gandhi, through his Twitter account, keeps exposing China. He was the 1^st one who informed the world about Coronavirus even before WHO. In fact, it was he who had kept a tab on the progress during his top-secret visit to Wuhan a few years back.

Further, only people in revenue intelligence could crack what Rahul Gandhi meant when he said “Ek taraf se aaloo dalunga and dusre taraf se sona niklega”. It was a hidden intel to find the gold hidden in the rectum. He went all the way to Kerala to get elected as an MP from Wayanad to let the world at large know that rectum gold will be found in Kerala.

Rahul Gandhi is so hardworking that even when he was holidaying in the undisclosed foreign location he didn’t forget his duty and wrote a letter to Twitter about his follower count going down. He even spent time drawing up colorful graphs and compared his follower count with another ladykiller like the charming Shashi Tharoor. Even Tharoor got thousands of followers these past few months while Rahul Gandhi lost his followers.

Sources close to Congress tell us that Rahul Gandhi had actually planned a visit to Ajmer and visit the Dargah to pray for increasing his followers. But he was reminded that he should not trigger Sachin Pilot, the only loyalist left in Congress otherwise even the Gehlot govt in Rajasthan will topple and one more state will be lost along with Twitter followers. So as a precautionary measure he visited Punjab to make sure at least Sidhu sticks around instead of crossing over the border.

PM Modi has assured that for the next few days at least no new Congress leader’s job application to the BJP will be accepted.

References:

opindia.com - Shashank Singh