Amid the many controversies surrounding the election season was a tweet by the Shailesh J Mehta School of Management (@SJMSoM) of the Indian Institute of Technology — Bombay (IIT-B) that sparked controversy on Monday afternoon. The politically-coloured tweet received much criticism on the social media platform. The tweet was soon deleted and the institute's official public relations office immediately issued a clarification, and the official twitter handle was deactivated too.

"Because Hinduism and Hindutva are not the same. Being religious and being stupid are two different things. People here maybe religious but not stupid enough to vote for #BJP," the tweet read. It was posted in response to a tweet by political commentator and columnist Shefali Vaidya reading: "The @BJP4India's message for WB is clear, now it is up to people of WB to decide whether they want to save their culture or be West Bangladesh!" The columnist was referring to a news article about BJP President Bharat Shah's speech in Kolkata stating, "If someone can restore Saraswati pooja and Durga pooja with respect, it is only the BJP."