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Is Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter Popularity Because of ‘Bots’? Report Sparks Off A Twitter War Of Words.

According to a report by news agency Asian News International, Twitterbots are behind the ‘resurgence of Rahul Gandhi’s interaction on social media’. The report went on to claim that bots of Russian, Kazakh and Indonesian origin were regularly retweeting the Congress VP’s Tweets, thus boosting Mr Gandhi’s visibility on the microblogging platform.

Bots behind rise in Rahul Gandhi’s twitter popularity?

Read @ANI Story | https://t.co/gwgXetKzhM pic.twitter.com/PQN6p6Wku9

— ANI Digital (@ani_digital)
October 21, 2017

Before proceeding any further, it is important to understand what a bot, or in this case, a ‘Twitterbot’ is. A Twitterbot is a piece of software/code that accesses an account via the Twitter API and can be programmed to automatically perform tasks like retweeting, favouriting, following accounts, etc. The behaviour of the bots, hence, depends entirely on what they have been programmed to do.

Information and Broadcasting Minister Smriti Irani took to twitter for a jibe at Rahul Gandhi. This is what Ms Irani said:

Perhaps @OfficeOfRG planning to sweep polls in Russia, Indonesia & Kazakhstan ?? #RahulWaveInKazakh https://t.co/xVanl2mKGh https://t.co/Yhl1oAGqOg

— Smriti Z Irani (@smritiirani)
October 21, 2017

Soon after Irani’s dig, other BJP leaders too took potshots at Rahul Gandhi over his reported use of ‘bots’. Ms Irani’s junior in the ministry, Rajyavardhan Rathore, compared the act to doping in sports.

In sports, this would come under ‘Doping’…. hey wait!does ‘dope’ remind you of someone https://t.co/xulfk1ENtI

— Rajyavardhan Rathore (@Ra_THORe)
October 21, 2017

This is what Subramanian Swamy Tweeteed:

Everything about Buddhu is bogus or fraud: Citizenship, College Degree, Twitter Following, Speeches, Foreign Travel etc..

— Subramanian Swamy (@Swamy39)
October 21, 2017

Amit Malviya, in-charge of BJP’s national Information & Technology, targeted Gandhi in a series of tweets. Mr Malviya even brought out screenshots of the ‘bot’ accounts RT-ing Rahul Gandhi’s tweets to drive home his point:

Amit Malviya on RG – Curated tweets by insenroy

Divya Spandana, who heads the Social Media and Digital Communications wing of the Indian National Congress, hit back at Smriti Irani and termed the news story as “factually wrong”.

Why do we need them when we have you? https://t.co/2lGH49maeD

— Divya Spandana/Ramya (@divyaspandana)
October 21, 2017

Story is factually wrong. Can understand your eagerness to please the I&B ministry and the Bots Janata Party. https://t.co/qQfqi6jMfc

— Divya Spandana/Ramya (@divyaspandana)
October 21, 2017

To this, Amit Malviya reacted, Tweeting:

Congress social media head was on a PR overdrive on how she re-launched Rahul Gandhi.. She deployed fake bots! https://t.co/fjhLTjEkI7 pic.twitter.com/iHfTdcIyKh

— Amit Malviya (@malviyamit)
October 21, 2017

Source: News18