A few imposter accounts in the name of activist Mohammed Asif Khan have appeared on Twitter, just days after his original account was suspended by the microblogging platform.
The fake accounts have used Khan's photo and his name, and one of them has also published an article under the name of Mohammed Ashif Khan on the website Youth Ki Awaaz.
BOOM reached out to Khan, who confirmed to us that he does not have a back up or alternate account on Twitter, and that all new accounts impersonating him are fake.
"I have no backup or alternate account on Twitter. Neither I have intention to create any new account, all accounts in my name are fake. I'll wait until Twitter reinstates my account," Khan told BOOM.
Khan's original handle @imMAK02 had over 82,000 followers on Twitter. On his account he frequently posted about crimes against minorities in India, and has been a vocal critic of the Central government.
On Friday, his account was suspended as five of his tweets were found to allegedly violate the Information Technology Act 2020.
Just a day after the suspension, an account by the name Md Ashif Khan appeared with a few handle similar to Khan's suspended account - @iamMAK02.
Here is an archived link of the new Twitter account.
The account had 23 tweets and gained 24 followers at the time of writing this article.
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Similar to Khan's original account, the imposter also posted news articles detailing crimes against Muslims in India. Khan told BOOM that the imposter had initially used his photo in the fake account, but removed it later.
Screenshot of the account with the profile photo, sent by Khan to BOOM.
The Twitter bio also contained a link to a Youth Ki Awaaz article, written under the name of Md Ashif Khan - using the same misnomer with an extra 'H' in the second name, as used in the Twitter account.
The article attempts to dispel the idea that there is hatred against the Muslim community in India, which is unlike Khan's usual work of documenting hate crimes against minorities, including Muslims.
Khan further confirmed to us that no such article had been written by him.
We also noticed another fake account with the handle @imMAK03, which also claimed to be run by Khan. However, Khan denied it was his.
Twitter, which is currently embroiled in a bitter fight with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology over the sovereignty of content on the platform, had also recently locked the account of the Minister of Electronics of IT, Ravi Shankar Prasad.
Also read Twitter Locks IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad's Account For An Hour
