RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat Has Joined Twitter, But Has ‘No Plans to Tweet’

New Delhi: It’s been a week since Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat joined Twitter, but there have been no tweets from his account so far. He is present but not active, and is not likely to tweet.

Some RSS functionaries told News18 that Bhagwat’s decision to make his presence on the social media, despite his dislike for the medium, is due to the challenges posed by fake profiles and impersonation of the leader.

The BJP's ideological mentor, along with six other national level functionaries of the organisation, joined Twitter on Monday, taking the social media users by surprise.

Bhagwat chose @DrMohanBhagwat as his handle. The other leaders who got their handles verified include Krishna Gopal, Suresh Soni, Suresh Joshi, Arun Kumar, V Bhagaiah and Anirudh Deshpande.

“The RSS leaders, especially Bhagwat, came on Twitter to stop the impersonation trend. It had become a problem for all of us to deal with the confusion. On various occasions, there were tweets from fake accounts that didn’t match with the RSS ideology. Common people don’t know about the impersonation trend and believe the handles that said incorrect things,” said an RSS functionary on the condition of anonymity.

“After getting several fake accounts suspended, the Sangh leaders realised that it was time for them to step in and make things clear once and for all. Bhagwat will remain on Twitter but has no plans to tweet. Handle @rss.org will remain the official account from where all the communication of Sangh leadership will take place, just as before,” the RSS functionary told News18.

The RSS joined Twitter in 2011 and its official handle has over 1.3 million followers and has, till now, been the organisation's platform for releasing statements.

“The departure from the past trend is only to avoid confusion due to impersonation,” said RSS functionary.

Earlier, during an interaction with the editors of Organiser and Panchjanya — two RSS-affiliated publications — Bhagwat had explained that people often try to assert their opinions on others with their social media posts and “even after knowing that my opinion is part of a collective whole”, without waiting for the collective opinion, “the person ends up talking about his personal beliefs on social media".

“(For people) social media means me, my and mine and that they have to express their opinion on each and every issue,” he had said.