Janjivan Bureau / New Delhi : A day after Bollywood actress Deepika Padukone visited JNU to express solidarity with the students who were attacked by a mob, a controversy erupted with #boycottchhapaak trending on Twitter and even a BJP MP calling for boycotting her latest film.
‘Chhapaak’ is the upcoming movie of Padukone based on an acid attack survivor.
South Delhi BJP MP Ramesh Bidhuri on Wednesday asked people to boycott ‘Chhapaak’ for her support to the “tukde-tukde gang”.
Bidhuri said a Bollywood star is supposed to give a “positive message” to youth in the country through movies instead of being seen with those who are against the country.
Padukone on Tuesday visited JNU and met students who were injured in an attack by masked men and women on Sunday last.
Meanwhile, Union minister Prakash Javadekar said not only artistes, even a common man can go anywhere to express his opinion and there cannot be any objection over it.
“Why only artistes, any common man can go anywhere to express his opinion, there cannot be any objection,” Javadekar said when asked about Padukone attending a protest in JNU.
Asked about the call by some BJP functionaries to boycott her upcoming movie, Javadekar said he had not read the remarks and sought to underscore the significance of his statement, saying he is stating so as a minister and regular BJP spokesperson.
Padukone’s decision to attend the protest meeting, even though she did not speak at it, has riled up some people, who have called for a boycott of her movie Chhapaak.
I don’t have any right to comment against deepika, that she joined tukde tukde gang. It’s her personal decision..
The only reason I’m not giving a call for #boycottchhapaak is because movie is for a good cause. @deepikapadukone did extremely unethical thing by supporting JNU Leftists, the main culprits and the actual attackers! She should be ashamed for playing politics for movie promotion!
This is really wrong by makers of #Chhapaak… if Acid attacker name was Naeem Khan then the same name should have been used in film as well… Ye Rajesh kya hai??this is totally unacceptable, if the film is based on true incidents then have courage to keep same name as well…
Deepika Padukone said “it’s the same fear I felt two years at the time of Padmavat. I’m afraid this should not become new normal”. It’s a statement indeed for students/protestors Keep fighting the fight.
They had even cancelled their tickets to the film, which opens on Friday and some social media users posted screenshots.
However, it did not take long to figure out that a lot of people who tweeted #boycottchhapaak and posted screenshots were curiously sharing the exact same tickets, seats A8, A9 and A10 for the 6.50 pm show at a theatre in Vadodara.
Another point of controversy gaining traction on Twitter was the name of the attacker who threw acid on Laxmi Agarwal was Nadeem Khan which is purportedly changed to Rajesh in the movie.
