Toolkit: Congress writes to Twitter seeking 'manipulative media' tag on tweets of 11 union ministers

The All India Congress Committee (AICC) on Tuesday approached Twitter demanding that it affix the ‘manipulated media’ tag to tweets and retweets of 11 Union ministers in the same way that the microblogging site tagged BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra’s tweet alleging a Congress Covid ‘toolkit’. The AICC letter to Twitter pointed out these Union ministers too had similar tweets/retweets on their timeline, and attached those links as evidence.

In his official letter to Twitter’s Lead for legal, policy and trust, and safety, Vijaya Gadde, and its deputy general counsel and vice-president (legal) Jim Baker, AICC spokesperson Randeep Surjewala alleged that the ‘forged, fabricated material’ and the claims made under #CongressToolkitExposed by various ministers are identical to the material already been marked as ‘manipulated media’ by Twitter.

The Union ministers named in the AICC letter were Ravi Shankar Prasad, Harsh Vardhan, Piyush Goyal, Smriti Irani, Pralhad Joshi, Dharmendra Pradhan, Giriraj Singh, Ramesh Pokhriyal, Thawar Chand Gehlot, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Gajendra Singh Shekhawat.


The Congress escalating its fight against the BJP coincided with the Delhi Police sending notices to two AICC functionaries, Rajeev Gowda and Rohan Gupta, who had approached the police to file an FIR against Patra. The AICC has said that the party would proceed with the FIR already filed in Chhattisgarh on the matter and pointed out that no case has been registered in Delhi till now.

On Monday, the Delhi Police had sent a notice to Twitter India in connection with the probe into a complaint about the alleged ‘toolkit’.