When you have been trolled on social media as often as I have, you learn to ignore the garbage that is flung at you. I am also aware that on social media political parties that do not like what you write or say have discovered that the way to shut you up is by maligning you so that you finally agree with them or shut up. As someone whose private life has been dredged through filth regularly on social media, I have chosen to ignore trolls from both our main political parties.

If this week I am choosing to pay attention to spiteful trolls and the tawdry political machinery that keeps them in business, it is because it is not possible to remain silent when you are accused of treason. Silence against a charge as serious as treason is unwise at the best of times and more so in the wake of a war when hostilities remain so alive that the Prime Minister rarely makes a speech these days in which he does not threaten Pakistan. Hostilities are still so alive that Pakistani singers have been erased from Spotify and thousands of Pakistani social media handles have been erased as well. Why India should be so insecure in victory is hard to understand but that is a subject for another day.

This week let me stick to the treason charge that was flung at me last week on social media. As someone who has just........

© Indian Express