Tea café brand Chaayos came under fire on Thursday after social media users pointed out that its Twitter account liked ‘offensive’ tweets. While the company issued a statement condemning the action, founder and CEO Nitin Saluja claimed that the Twitter account of Chaayos was hacked for about half hour when those offensive tweets were liked. “I want to personally ensure everyone that as a founder and as an organisation, we respect all faiths equally,” Saluja tweeted.
Under the ‘likes’ button of Chaayos, those tweets were found by social media users. One such tweet said, “Radical Muslims are snakes, moderate Muslims are the grass they hide in”. In its statement, Chaayos said, “There was an offensive tweet that was inadvertently liked from our account. Chaayos detested and denies any view mentioned in the said tweet. We apologise to everyone and to those who were impacted by it.”
“We want to assure our guests and team that as a responsible organisation we have always respected people of all faiths equally and shall continue to do so forever. We are investigating what led to this and shall take corrective action asap,” it said.
Row over Chaayos
The Twitter handle of Chaayos liked several other tweets of similar tenor criticising ‘moderate Islam’. Social media users questioned whether this is the official stand of the company.”@Chaayossells prepared beverages to consumers. how can you assure us that you don’t employ bigoted staff that may add dangerous substances to the orders of people bearing Muslim names or from other marginalized groups that they may have prejudices against?” a user wrote. Later, those offensive tweets were removed from its ‘likes’.
