Paresh Rawal, the famous Bollywood actor and a member of parliament of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), raked up a storm after he tweeted that it should be author Arundhati Roy who should be tied to an Army jeep instead of a stone pelter. His statement comes days after the controversy erupted in violence-hit Kashmir where a man was allegedly made a human shield by the Army to save themselves from stone pelters.
“Instead of tying stone pelter on the army jeep tie Arundhati Roy!” the Lok Sabha member from Gujarat had tweeted late on Sunday night. Not just Roy, he even retweeted a post by a user who suggested that journalist Sagarika Ghose should also be treated in a similar way.
Instead of tying stone pelter on the army jeep tie Arundhati Roy !
— Paresh Rawal (@SirPareshRawal) May 21, 2017
We have a wide variety of choices ! https://t.co/rpciWyhLha
— Paresh Rawal (@SirPareshRawal) May 21, 2017
But, is there anything new in a BJP member criticising Arundhati Roy? Here are 5 probable reasons why Paresh Rawal might be attacking the author of ‘The God of Small Things’.
Support for Kashmir: Back in 2008, Arundhati Roy had voiced her support for the independence of Kashmir. Her statement came in the wake of massive demonstrations by lakhs of separatists across Srinagar. She had then asserted that the rallies were a sign that the Kashmiris want to break away from the rest of India. She was then heavily criticised for what many termed as an ‘irresponsible’ comment.
Sedition: Arundhati Roy was booked on charges of sedition for her “anti-India” speech in 2010 during a conference on “Azadi-the Only Way”. She was not the only one to be charged with sedition. Hurriyat hawk Syed Ali Shah Geelani was also among those present at the same event who were booked on sedition charges. Reacting to the charges, the author had stated that charges should be levelled ‘posthumously’ against Jawaharlal Nehru and spoke of 14 instances where the first Prime Minister had said that “accession in any disputed territory or state must be decided in accordance with wishes of people”.
Pro-Naxal stand: Her opposition to the government’s policies against Naxals are not hidden. She has repeatedly taken on the Central government’s action against the Naxalite-Maoist insurgency. She even went to the extent of calling Maoists “Gandhians” and “patriots of a kind”. Backing the Naxals, she has always termed a war against them as action against the “poorest people” of the country. She has always maintained that the governments at the Centre acted against Naxals to aid corporate interests.
Award wapasi: In November 2015, Arundhati Roy joined a brigade of intellectuals who decided to return their awards amid cases of ‘rising intolerance’ in the country. The author, who had received the 1989 National Film Award for Best Screenplay for a documentary, gave it back protesting against “ideological viciousness”.
Critical of Narendra Modi: Arundhati Roy has been very critical of Narendra Modi. When Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) announced the candidature of the then Gujarat Chief Minister as the party’s prime ministerial nominee, the author had termed it a “tragedy”. Criticising Modi, she had said: “From being this open sort of communal hatred-spewing saccharine person, he then put on the suit of a corporate man, and, you know, is now trying to play the role of the statesmen, which he’s not managing to do really.”
But were these the only reasons or did Paresh Rawal have any other context to his tweet? This, only he can tell us.
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