Vice President of India, M Venkaiah Naidu on Saturday lost his Twitter verification for some time. While the company has withdrawn the blue tick from his personal Twitter handle, it appeared to have been restored several hours later. His official handle, @VPSecretariat also continues to remain verified. It is however unclear as to what led to this.
As per Twitter's policies, it can remove the blue verified badge and verified status of a Twitter account at any time and without notice if an account changes its username (@handle) or an account becomes inactive or incomplete or if the owner of the account is no longer for which position they were initially verified and do not otherwise meet our criteria for verification since leaving such position.
Presently Twitter allows verification for six types of notable accounts: government, companies, brands and non-profit organizations, news organizations and journalists, entertainment, sports and esports as well as activists, organizers, and other influential individuals.
While Naidu's personal handle has over 1.3 million followers, it is no longer a verified account. It must however be noted that the account has been dormant for nearly a year, with Naidu's last tweet being shared on July 23, 2020.
The news had sparked off a wave of criticism online, with over 10 thousand tweets being posted at the time of writing this article. While some took to comparing other purportedly inactive accounts that had managed to hold on to their blue ticks, several individuals assured that they no longer wanted to get themselves verified. BJP Mumbai Spokesperson Suresh Nakhua dubbed it an "assault" against the Constitution".
"Why did @Twitter @TwitterIndia remove Blue tick from the handle of Vice President of India Shri @MVenkaiahNaidu ji ? This is assault of Constitution of India," he tweeted sharing a screengrab.
"If the Vice President of India can be unticked why should I be interested in getting a blue tick? I was planning to request for #BlueTick but I am rethinking now. It is not worth it. If @Twitter doesn’t respect @MVenkaiahNaidu why should I seek its approval?" commented one user.
Several others cited Nigeria's recent ban of the microblogging platform to call for similar action in India.
