KOLKATA: Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said on Saturday that he did not send the controversial tweet on former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s death anniversary and that his account had been hacked.
The controversial tweet was posted on Chowdhury’s official Twitter account at 11:27 a.m. on Rajiv Gandhi’s death anniversary on Saturday. A statement attributed to Rajiv Gandhi was included in an infographic in the tweet. “When a big tree falls, the ground shakes,” it said.
When anti-Sikh riots erupted following the assassination of his mother, former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, in 1984, Rajiv Gandhi reportedly made the statement. Opposition leaders have claimed that the statement was made to justify anti-Sikh riots on several occasions. Almost 3,000 people were killed in the riots across the country.
“My Twitter account was compromised.” Why should I say things like this? “I’m going to file a police complaint in Kolkata,” Chowdhury told HT.
The tweet was quickly removed and replaced with another with a different infographic.
“Those forces opposed to me are waging a malicious campaign. He later tweeted, “The tweet against my name in the tweeter account has nothing to do with my own observation.”
Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a suicide bomber from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) during an election rally in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, on this day in 1991.
