Twitter, which was acquired last week by billionaire Elon Musk, plans to let go of a quarter of its workforce as part of what is expected to be a first round of layoffs, the Washington Post reported on Monday, citing a person familiar with the matter.

Celebrity lawyer Alex Spiro, a long-time Musk legal representative, led the conversations about the job cuts, according to the report.

Twitter had over 7,000 employees at the end of 2021, according to a regulatory filing and a quarter of the headcount amounts to nearly 2,000 employees.

Musk denied a New York Times report about laying off Twitter employees at a date earlier than November 1 to avoid stock grants due on the day.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Musk fired Twitter Chief Executive Parag Agrawal, Finance Chief Ned Segal and Legal Affairs and Policy Chief Vijaya Gadde on completion of a six-month $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,62,300 crore) buyout saga of the social media platform on Thursday, sources told Reuters.

In another news, it was reported that Twitter will start charging $20 (roughly Rs. 1,600) fee for the ‘blue tick’, which authenticates the identity of the account holder. Meanwhile, failure to pay the amount will result in the coveted status being withdrawn.

However, Union Minister of State for Electronics and Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar has refuted these reports. In his statement to ANI, MoS Chandrasekhar said, “I do not think this is true. This is a challenge for Twitter. They need to see how this miscommunication is being circulated on the platform. I do not think such reports are true.”

According to several reports, Musk is planning to charge users $19.99 (nearly Rs. 1600) for the new Twitter Blue subscription. Under the current plan, verified users would have 90 days to subscribe or lose their blue checkmark.