Riding high on the tempo of the BJP’s electoral sweep in three heartland states, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday appeared to be enthusiastically encouraging the apparent troll-like behaviour of a news anchor slamming a group of purportedly anti-BJP and anti-Modi “commentators” analysing the poll results.

“May they be happy with their arrogance, lies, pessimism and ignorance. But... beware of their divisive agenda. An old habit of 70 years can’t go away so easily. Also, such is the wisdom of the people that they have to be prepared for many more meltdowns ahead,” Modi posted on X, endorsing a post by the TV anchor. In his post, Modi used a number of emojis that are commonly used by online trolls to grab eyeballs.

The video posted by India Today TV anchor Shiv Aroor was captioned “Meltdown-e-Azam”, and Modi sought to endorse and encourage the views expressed in it by assuring that “many more meltdowns” or many more electoral setbacks were awaiting the anti-BJP forces.

In the video, the TV anchor can be heard lashing out at “commentators and analysts” slamming the “illiterate voters” of the three Hindi heartland states for ensuring a BJP sweep in the polls.

This unusual post from a Prime Minister saw some X users slamming Modi, including a Congress leader. “Did malware forget to switch accounts? This can’t be the tweet from the official X account of the Indian PM!” Srinivas BV, national president of the Congress’s youth wing posted.

“Real account?”, one user asked in reply to Modi’s tweet. “Full troll baazi Modi Ji,” another user replied. “I thought this was a parody account,” another reply said.