People may not always see eye to eye, but a common consensus seems to be that one should not go out of their way to speak ill of the dead. Hours after former interim CBI director M. Nageswara Rao took to Twitter to say that the death of Swami Agnivesh was "good riddance", the post now seems to have been removed as it "violated the Twitter Rules".
For the uninitiated, Rao had reacted to the demise of the former Arya Samaj leader and social activist stating that he was an "anti-hindu donning saffron clothes". "You did enormous damage to Hinduism. I am ashamed that you were born as a Telugu Brahmin," he added, expressing a grievance that Yamaraj had waited this long.
And while this raised many censuring eyebrows, the former IPS officer was unrepentant. "Why do we celebrate as festivals the days savages were dead? Bcoz they're pests destroying society and their death is a cause for celebration. It was also to warn people not to patronise the bad. Hinduism eschews अपात्र दानं and misplaced sympathy as they destroy giver and sympathiser (sic)," he told another Twitter user who had pointed out that his tweet was in bad taste.
Following the post, the Indian Police Foundation put out a censuring message stating that his comments had "desecrated the police uniform which he wore and embarrassed the government". At the same time, RTI activist Saket Gokhale pointed out that former IPS officers could not use the tag after their retirement.
"The vile @MNageswarRaoIPS is a retired IPS. Yet continues to use “IPS” in his display name which isn’t allowed under Civil Service Rules. Rao - remove the IPS suffix from your display name by today evening. Else a case will be filed for impersonating a police officer," he had tweeted earlier in the day.
Later in the day, as his comments went unheeded, Gokhale once again took to twitter stating that a complaint had been filed with the Department of Personnel and Training for "for illegal use of suffix "IPS" in his name and impersonating a serving police officer."
"What he's doing is a crime under IPC Section 170, punishable with jail up to two years. Rao - Change your display name. ASAP," he added.
Section 170 incidentally states that a person pretending to hold the office of a public servant while not actually being a part of the same, can be punished with imprisonment up to two years or a fine, or both.
