The actor speaks on how the country is no more or no less intolerant than before and the futility of returning awards
Anupam Kher, Neena Gupta and Rakesh Bedi staged their play Mera Woh Matlab Nahi Tha in Hyderabad on Thursday. Ahead of the play, we caught up with Kher for a chat on everything India is currently.
‘Award Waapsi’ “There is a large section of people who think that India is not going through intolerance. I’m one of them. I don’t see any fear in people’s lives. It’s also very important to be positive towards your country. The Dadri lynching and murder of Prashant Pujari were unfortunate events. You cannot say that now, in the last 14 months, the country has become very intolerant. And in 67 years, you cannot say the Emergency was not an intolerant period, the Sikh massacre was not an intolerant period and Kashmiri pandits being thrown out of their homes was not intolerant. We have dealt with it in the past. We are a very diverse nation. To term the country as intolerant is a way of embarrassing the government. “PM Modi needs to deal with few people in his party who are talking rubbish. But people from other parties also have made such irresponsible statements. Modi is the most abused guy. They have called him khoon ka saudagar, bhasmasur and all kind of names. The fact that you have the liberty to call the Prime Minister all that on a national level means India is a very tolerant country. “Some people who are calling India intolerant are the same people who had signed a petition saying Modi should not become the PM, so I think they have a vested interest. Why didn’t they all go and try to meet him for a discussion Had the PM said that he doesn’t want to do anything about it then I would have understood returning awards was the only way that was open to them. We have no business of maligning our country. At the end of it, you are making a mockery of the country for your personal interest.”
Dibakar Banerjee’s ‘fraud’ “All those people who are returning awards should understand that the award has been given by the people. And for every movie, there is a unit that worked hard for it. Look at Dibakar Banerjee and how his fraud was exposed. He returned an award that does not even belong to him, but the producer. He got a National Award for two movies — Khosla Ka Ghosla and Oye Lucky Lucky Oye. He returned the award for Khosla Ka Ghosla which was made by the producer with great difficulty — who had to mortgage her house and he returned that award. When I caught his lie, he said, ‘I only returned my portion of the award’. If he had to return, why did he not return the award for Oye Lucky Lucky Oye Because the producer was Disney and he wouldn’t want to mess with them; but why mess with the first producer who gave him a break This is also selective outrage. Did no such incident take place before 2014 which made them feel, ‘I don’t want to keep the award ’”
‘Actors should be selective with their comments’ “Actors should be very selective with statements (on SRK saying there is growing intolerance in country). When you are very popular, it’s your responsibility to think before you speak. Because comments can instigate a lot of people. I spoke against the ‘award waapsi’ gang because they are showing India in a bad light. “You know you cannot become a superstar without the support of all Indians. Shah Rukh Khan is a national icon and he is as patriotic as I am. He has the right to say that he is going through intolerance. But Yogi Adityanath messed it up by comparing him with Hafiz Saeed.”
freedom of expression “I don’t like it when people call me takle (bald) and abuse me on Twitter. But I reply and say that I grant you your freedom of expression. Also, there are many who have made fake accounts and whose job is to attack. Every time something has bothered me, I have spoken up. I have been asked by so many parties to fight elections. I’m also the same person who was against Gajendra Chauhan being appointed FTII chairman. And if that was the case, I wouldn’t have spoken about Yogi Adityanath.”
