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Former aide says Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina does not have an account, page or handle on social media, including Twitter
Twitter suspended the verified impersonated personal account of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Friday, February 17, after the authorities in Bangladesh took up the matter for action.
“It is observed that this Twitter account is being promoted as the official account of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. But the claim is false,” the press wing of Bangladesh’s Prime Minister’s office said.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina does not have an account, page or handle on social media, including Twitter, a former aide of Hasina confirmed to The New Indian.
“The handle @Sheikh_HasinaBD, which Twitter verified for some reason, was neither operated by the PM nor her office,” he explained further.
The account looked suspicious, and this correspondent apprised a former special aide to Prime Minister Hasina of the matter on Friday afternoon.
The New Indian also rang up some other officials in the ICT ministry of the Bangladesh government to cross-check the authenticity of the account.
The introduction of the impersonated account, which earned the verified blue tick from Twitter, read, “Current Prime Minister of Bangladesh and daughter of the founding father and first President of Bangladesh, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.”
The account was opened in January 2021 and verified recently. The verified impersonated account had a follower base of just 17 people, compared to the following count of 139 people.
As per Twitter’s new policy, a state leader or head of government is awarded the grey checkmark, which appears across his or her name on the microblogging platform, recently acquired by business tycoon and serial entrepreneur Elon Musk.
The grey tick on Twitter indicates a government individual, institution or multilateral organisation. Prime Minister Narendra Modi to President Joe Biden of the US have grey-tick across their names on Twitter.
Interestingly, the verified Twitter account of Prime Minister Hasina was bearing a blue tick. Several state leaders, including Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of Pakistan, still have the blue-tick mark instead of the grey mark on their Twitter accounts.
