The smallest rows can prompt a fierce war of words on Twitter. And if the dispute has political overtones, as in the instance of the Jawaharlal Nehru University sedition case, it can cause a veritable firestorm on the social networking platform.

A familiar script played out on Twitter late Saturday night. And it started with Bollywood actor Anupam Kher, a self-professed supporter of the Bharatiya Janata Party, tweeting that the country is going through “a pest control”, resulting in insects like “cockroaches crawling out”.

Presumably a dig at those he considers “anti-national”, Kher’s tweet didn’t sit well with many, including well-known journalist Rajdeep Sardesai, who decided to take him head-on late in the night.

Kher didn’t take it quietly, and an exchange followed.

Sardesai didn’t back off and sent out another tweet to Kher, this time wishing him good night.

Meanwhile, a parody account, @surdesairajdeep, stepped into the fight on Sunday morning to get in a word.

The showdown resumed on Sunday evening, as Sardesai tweeted one final response, albeit without tagging Kher this time.

In a mark of Kher’s popularity on Twitter, his tweets received close to 5,000 retweets each. Sardesai’s responses, however, managed less than 1,000.

The whole episode predictably left some on Twitter amused and others furious.