Novelist Chetan Bhagat on Sunday announced that he would join Congress as the country needed to be ‘fixed’. The author of the book ‘One night at the call centre’ added that he would be supporting the Rahul Gandhi-led party in their Karnataka campaign.

Karnataka Assembly elections will be held on May 12, while the counting of the votes will take place on 15 May.

The writer took to micro-blogging site Twitter to make the announcement as he posted, “Couldn’t take it anymore. The country needs to be fixed. Joining Congress. Will be supporting their Karnataka campaign. With RG, let’s make a better India. Need your blessings in what is a big move for me.”

Couldn’t take it anymore. The country needs to be fixed. Joining Congress. Will be supporting their Karnataka campaign. With RG, let’s make a better India. Need your blessings in what is a big move for me. Details here: https://t.co/DcVhWYV3Kx

— Chetan Bhagat (@chetan_bhagat) April 1, 2018

Bhagat’s Twitter timeline was soon flooded with mixed reactions. His decision of joining the Congress seems to have angered a lot of people, who pointed out that the writer had attacked the party on many occasions in the past.

Wrong move also unexpected from u .. I have read many articles before u were against them how come just for being into power u r supporting these corrupted party and praising RG who dun even know what India wants ? Think thousand times before u make it officially

— Sumit Verma (@katsboyfrnd) April 1, 2018

Joining CONGRESS? How could you?

— Arti Agarwal (@arti_agarwal) April 1, 2018

Some people, however, congratulated Bhagat on his decision and wished him a good run in politics.

Good luck ! You are a revolutioner in writing may it works in politics ..good for India !!

— hossainjaved (@caneberry18) April 1, 2018

appreciate sir good decision in the interest of country

— Ramesh Tekriwal (@tekriwal49) April 1, 2018

There were also some people who actually saw through the tweet and immediately realised that it was an ‘April Fools’ Day’ joke.

Thank you @chetan_bhagat for your April Fool message…just liked it…I am sure this was liked by many supporters of the Dynasty…..🙏🙏😂😂😂😂

— Shripati Ankolekar (@shripati6577) April 1, 2018

Best April Fools prank of the day! 😝😅 Was stunned until the wiki link loaded #AprilFoolsDay2018

— Ninaad Achalkar (@NinaadAchalkar) April 1, 2018

Yes, to the disappointment of people who were happy with the decision of Bhagat joining Congress, it was just a prank.

Bhagat added a link at the end of his tweet saying it holds more details regarding his decision. The link redirects a user to the ‘April Fool’s Day’ page.

Well, it seems that a lot of people fell for the ‘innocent’ prank and it’s safe to say that the Wikipedia page on ‘April Fools’ Day’ is witnessing footfall in large number today.

As we visited the page, this is the message that we got, “Sorry, the servers are overloaded at the moment. Too many users are trying to view this page. Please wait a while before you try to access this page again.”