Twitter had suspended Singer Abhijeet's verified account over his provocative comments
Singer Abhijeet Bhattacharya returned to Twitter yesterday with a new, unverified account @singerabhijeet, a week after it was suspended over his controversial posts. Within hours, the new account was suspended too.
"The account you are trying to view has been suspended," read a message on the Twitter page that the 58-year-old singer set up on Monday.
In a video posted on his new account, Abhijeet had said: "People are trying to suppress my voice. I am against those who try to speak against the nation and the Indian Army. This is my new Twitter account. Till the time my verified account is not active, please follow me on this Twitter account. All other accounts by my name are fake and are trying to malign my reputation."
He added, "Boliye jai hind, bharat mata ki jai. Vande Matram. I am back. We will together eliminate all those who raise their voice against the country."
He told the ANI news agency that it was "very important" for him to stay on Twitter.
"Twitter earns its revenue through us...Only losers, left-minded, Maoists are baffled and have found a platform to spit venom... I will expose such people and it is very important for me to stay on twitter," he said.
Last Tuesday, Twitter had suspended Abhijeet's verified account over his provocative comments, especially targeting women, including JNU student and activist Shehla Rashid.
A day later, his colleague Sonu Nigam quit Twitter, explaining in 24 tweets that he was saddened by what he perceived as a lack of freedom of speech. Another Hindi film veteran, actor Paresh Rawal, also faced trouble over his tweets and alleged last week that he had been "forced" to delete a comment in which he had said author Arundhati Roy should be tied to an army jeep - a reference to the "human shield" video in Kashmir.