I don’t care about what your religion is. As long as you put India over religion, I can talk to you. I usually do not care about what Bollywood people say unless it is about something related to India. Hence I choose to respond to what you said yesterday.
Here is one part of your statement:
“As an individual, as part of this country as a citizen, we read in the papers what is happening, we see it on the news and certainly, I have been alarmed. I can’t deny. I have been alarmed by a number of incidents. When I chat with Kiran at home, she says ‘Should we move out of India?’ That’s a disastrous and big statement for Kiran to make. She fears for her child. She fears about what the atmosphere around us will be. She feels scared to open the newspapers every day.”
I don’t understand how can you believe what media is saying. Courts have not yet passed any judgement on killing of Akhlaq, so coming to a conclusion is completely wrong. Media & politicians are not above court’s decision. Media made huge hue and cry out of many incidents like burning of two dalit children, “lunching” of a man in Manipur over a calf, but do you know the alternate versions which emerged later, some from CBI investigations?
Another example was Jasleen Kaur & Sarabjit Singh case. Mr. Arvind Kejriwal congratulated Jasleen, Times Now was forcing Sarabjit to apologize, Sarabjit lost his job, and his life was destroyed. Why? Because of media trial & verdict. Initial reports from police point towards a false case. This was a stray incident. By the way, most of the media channels didn’t cover the story after police reports. They don’t have guts to say sorry and take responsibility for destroying his life.
Ironically, just one minute after you made the above statement, you were asked whether you had faith in the media. You said “Partly”, “I cant say I have complete faith in the media”. So I am trying to understand this, your views about India are defined by the media, who you yourself say you cant trust fully. So can we trust your views?
Why no intolerance bogey is raised when people are raped, domestic violence, false cases, Indian politicians condemning Indian Government on foreign soil, labelling India’s enemy (who do ceasefire violations like it is their bread and butter) as apostle of peace?
If we go by the logic of media/politicians/some random people’s comments, America is the most intolerant nation in the world. A police officer kills a guy because of his race or people open fire in schools etc.
Some people are talking / Media is showing as if there are 100s being killed every day. When I go out I don’t find any difference in mood of people, they are same as they were few months back. I don’t know on which road Kiran goes. I am sure she does analyze things and cross check, if not then she should.
You say, “People who are our elected representatives, people who we select to look after us for five years, state or center… when people take law into their hands, we look upon these people to take a strong stance, to make a strong statement, speed up the legal process, when we see that happening there is a sense of security but when we don’t see that happening there is a sense of insecurity” This is correct but timing is wrong because this has been the case since Independence not just in last 7-8 months. No justice have been given for over 3 crore cases, these many have not built up in last 18 months. Why only condemn comments on dadri?
Condemn politicians like Mulayam Singh Yadav & Azam Khan who say, “Often if one person commits rape, four people are named in the complaint. Four people are named for rape, can it be possible? It is not practical.”
Condemn Mani Shankar Aiyar. He is asking Pakistan to remove Modi and bring Congress to power, what does he mean by that? As Pakistanis can’t vote in India, they can only ask UN to put pressure on India or use terrorist attacks to remove Modi? Is he conspiring against the Prime Minister of India?
Condemn Salman Khurshid, he labels Nawaz Sharif as an apostle of peace. Nawaz Sharif was involved in Kargil War, directly or indirectly. Pakistan has done ceasefire violations innumerable times. And ex-foreign minister condemns Indian Government on foreign soil.
Condemn every wrong statement, be it Yogi Adityanath or Sadhvi Prachi or Azam Khan or Mulayam Singh or Mani Shankar Aiyar or someone else and don’t be partial.
You are right to say, “A number of creative people — historians, scientists — increasingly had a certain feeling in them, which they felt they need to express. For creative people, one of the ways of expressing their dissatisfaction or their disappointment is to return their awards. I think that’s one way of getting your point across all individuals have a right to protest and they can protest in any manner that they feel is right as long as they are not taking the law into their hands.”
People have right to return awards, protest and on the other hand I also have the right to question them. I could see a pattern in award returning. Before 8th Nov, so many people returned awards and from 9th Nov till today only one. People have backtracked on their earlier comments after 8th Nov. Shabana Azmi now says “Intolerance has always existed”. Shahrukh Khan now says he never said India was Intolerant. There are an equal number of artists and intellectuals who have slammed this “Award Wapsi” brigade.
Some people had political motives but a few innocent people were misled into returning their awards or supporting their campaign. Some news channels and newspapers led them to believe on intolerance. I applaud Anupam Kher, Vivek Agnihotri, Raveena Tandon and others for standing against the award returnees.
Lot of people admire you and such a comment coming from you is disappointing. You should condemn the stray incidents and say India is tolerant. Instill hope in Indians rather than fearing them. You are playing into the hands of people who want to show India is intolerant. We should not label whole nation on bases of few stray incidents just like you say it is wrong to connect Islam with terrorists. In fact at the same event, you said you don’t have full faith in media but you cant pass a sweeping statement and say you cant trust all media. Then why not extend this logic to India?
Which country are you planning to go to? Here are some options:
- USA (Children killed in schools, Blacks killed by cops, Ahmed the “clock boy” left USA, Cavity searches at airports), might be unsafe.
- Australia (Attack on Indian Students), might be unsafe in future.
- Sri Lanka (Attack on Tamils), is intolerant.
- France (Innocents are dying), might be unsafe.
- UK (Moeen Ali was booed), is intolerant.
- Nepal (Earthquake prone), might be unsafe.
- Singapore (Freedom of speech is restricted), is intolerant.
- South Africa (Apartheid was there, Crime is very high), was intolerant and might be unsafe.
Antarctica/Greenland might be a good place.
No offence to anyone. Sarcastic comments have been given to above countries, and all of them are tolerant and safe for everyone. I would love to get a reply from Aamir or anyone who shares views with Aamir Khan.
