Union minister of State for External Affairs VK Singh sparked off a fresh controversy by making snide remarks against a TV channel on Twitter on Wednesday.

While Mr. Singh’s party, the BJP distanced itself from the controversial tweet, the Congress slammed him for the remarks in which he referred to a section of the media as ‘presstitutes’ and demanded his removal.

“Friends what do you expect from presstitutes…” he said on Twitter setting off a war of tweets with several users taking strong positions for and against him. “Twitter is a personal platform and not a party platform and the meaning of the tweet can best be deciphered by the person concerned,” BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra said.

"It is very unfortunate that a minister is using abusive language against the media. He is holding a very important position. It is for the Prime Minister to take a call on this," Congress General Secretary said. His party colleague and spokesperson Khushboo Sundar said the comments were “deplorable” and showed his “insensitivity”.

“As a party, which has its government, we can say that the government is a guardian of democracy in India and going by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s words of ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’, this government is committed to the fact that all the pillars of democracy — the legislature, executive, judiciary and the fourth pillar media — move together to uphold democracy and for the betterment of the poorest of the poor,” he said.

“Operation Raahat is a great achievement,” Mr. Patra said, while distancing the party from the tweet but praising the former Army chief for the evacuation operation.

Gen Singh had created a controversy when said on Tuesday, “Actually speaking, the operation (evacuation) in Yemen is less exciting than going to the Pakistani embassy.” He followed up the controversial remarks with fresh ones on Wednesday.