What happens when our netas can't distinguish between Chandra Shekhar Azad and Bhagat Singh? What happens when they fail to distinguish between birth and death anniversaries? RJD leader and elder son of Lalu Prasad Yadav, Tej Pratap Yadav and Madhya Pradesh Congress chief Kamal Nath have done exactly that.

It’s public knowledge that Azad was born on 23 July, 1906 and went on to fight for the independence of the nation. He bravely took part in the Kakori train robbery of 1925, in the attempt to blow up the Viceroy of India's train in 1926, and the shooting of JP Saunders at Lahore in 1928 to avenge the attack on Lala Lajpat Rai that led to his death. But Tej Pratap, who harbours ambitions to rule Bihar, doesn’t even know the difference between Azad and Bhagat Singh. In a tweet to pay respect to Azad on his birth anniversary on Monday, Tej Pratap used a photo of Bhagat Singh instead, which made him the target of ridicule immediately.

That’s not all. Another senior leader from the Congress Kamal Nath goofed up in the microblogging site. He ‘paid homage’ to Bal Gangadhar Tilak on his ‘death anniversary’ on Twitter. The only problem was Tilak was born on 23 July.

While Nath deleted his post immediately after Twitterati expressed anguish at his lack of knowledge, Tej Pratap modified the tweet and posted again. But the damage was already done.

What makes it even more serious is that they are not newbies in the world of politics. Both are considered senior leaders in their respective parties. Tej Pratap is competing with his brother Tejaswi to become the chief minister of Bihar, whereas Rahul Gandhi has entrusted Nath with the responsibility to win Madhya Pradesh. It is unfortunate that leaders of such seniority can make mistakes that even school kids won’t.