Kangana Ranaut's Twitter account restored as 'Tandav' tweets deleted

Twitter regular Kangana Ranaut was back in action on the micro-blogging platform on Wednesday after her account was put under ‘read-only’ mode by the US-based tech company for two tweets from Monday that allegedly incited violence.

Shortly after Ranaut announced the enforcement action, a hashtag to #SuspendKanganaRanaut started trending on the platform in India, garnering over 35,000 tweets at the time of reporting.

Many Twitter accounts, including a few verified ones, called for the suspension, alleging that Ranaut's Twitter account often indulges in hatemongering. Many of the actor's supporters, too, used the same hashtag, albeit to condemn it, but ironically amplifying the trend.


Ranaut, in one now-deleted tweet whose screenshot has been doing the rounds on the platform, uses the phrase "time to take their heads off" — referring to a community that she believes does not respect her religion, Hinduism.

Responding to ET’s query, a Twitter spokesperson said, "We take action on any account that violates Twitter rules. We welcome people to freely express themselves on our service, however as outlined in our abusive behaviour policy, you may not engage in the targeted harassment of someone or incite other people to do so."

“We prohibit content that wishes, hopes or expresses a desire for death, serious bodily harm against an individual or group of people and take enforcement action when we identify violations which could include placing an account in read-only mode,” the spokesperson added.

While Ranaut used the term "temporarily restricted" to describe the enforcement action against her, details of the incident pointed to "Account-level enforcement" from Twitter that places an account under a "read-only mode".

According to the platform's policy under this section, "Ifit seems like an otherwise healthy account is in the middle of an abusive episode, we might temporarily make their account read-only, limiting their ability to Tweet, Retweet, or Like content until calmer heads prevail. The person can read their timelines and will only be able to send Direct Messages to their followers."

When an account is in read-only mode, other users can still engage with the account. The duration of
this enforcement action can range from 12 hours to 7 days, depending on the nature of the violation.

Soon after she was back on the platform though, Ranaut tweeted that even if her virtual identity is erased, she will "reappear in her reloaded desh bhakt (patriotic) version" through her movies and make life miserable for people she referred to as "Librus", slang used by some right-wingers to refer to liberals.