Randeep Hooda: My Mother And Sister Were Threatened After Gurmehar Kaur Controversy
He was branded a ‘sexist’ after speaking out against Delhi University student Gurmehar Kaur and now Randeep Hooda is paying the price for it
Randeep Hooda
will be seen on the small screen as the host of the MTV show Big F. To promote
the show, Randeep was live on Facebook a few minutes back. And to no one’s
surprise, the conversation was hijacked by the Gurmehar Kaur controversy.
Gurmehar Kaur, a
Delhi University student protested the recent violence at Ramjas College by
holding a written message on camera, which said that she is against the
violence allegedly perpetrated by ABVP (Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad).
Soon the trolls
came for her and the issue snowballed when cricketer Virender Sehwag and Randeep were accused of
bullying her on Twitter.
So as soon as the
Facebook video started, the first question was about the Gurmehar Kaur
controversy. “Elephant in the room. Huh,” started Randeep.
Then he went on
to explain his role in the controversy.
Image Source: twitter/virendersehwag, facebook/gurmehr7
“Firstly I
didn’t know who this girl was…I saw a tweet by Sehwag and I often laugh at his
jokes, since he makes funny jokes on all kinds of things and I just laughed at
it and left it and didn’t see any connotations on it!. Then I got some messages
and these prominent journalists started commenting and conversing about it, so
I went back on Twitter and I saw what was going on then I immediately said, do
not politicize this poor girl’s point of view and then those two words very
were taken up. ‘Poor’, you’re a misogynists and ‘girl’ said you are sexist.
But, if it was a boy I would have said the same thing! And I pointedly said
violence was wrong and peace must prevail and do not politicize a young girl’s
point of view. And people came up with all kinds of things.Despite being a
girl, she’s a thinking girl and I said yes I have taken the thinking girl for
granted.”
Randeep said that
he was then subjected to the same ‘bullying’ that he was accused of.
A petition to twitter to shut down accounts that give rape threats to women.. a heinous crime.. pls do the needful 🙏 https://t.co/B6iFhtH9fw
— Randeep Hooda (@RandeepHooda) March 7, 2017
“At that
moment I wasn’t aware of any threats to her at all and when I did become aware
of them, I immediately issued a statement, clarified my stand that violence is
wrong and violence against women is a heinous crime and the perpetrators should
be brought to justice and made an example of... But by the time the narrative
was set and I was labelled and put in a box!.”
“It seems
to me that we are not having a conversation anymore, as we tend to be abusive
and we are trolling people and I think that it’s absolutely wrong! You can have
a point of view and you can disagree that’s fine! It’s a democracy but to put
it in perspective, let’s come to the other part, Now remove me and Sehwag from
it, we are men, we don’t have emotions, we are not affected or hurt be the
abuse we get! Put us aside we are successful men and it doesn’t matter that it
took us 20 years to get where we have. Put us aside!,” the actor said, getting
emotional.
Image Source: twitter/RandeepHooda
After a long
pause, he revealed that after the controversy, the women in his family were
targeted too.
“The same
threats were given to our mothers and sisters and to Sehwag’s family,” revealed
Randeep.
He further added
that online trolls had targeted women like the Dangal sisters Babita Phoghat
and Geeta Phogat and Pooja Bhatt too.
“This
nameless thing, faceless thing, trolling is going on. Whether it’s a man or
women it’s very wrong! It’s absolutely a crime and you cannot threaten a woman
with violence on social media and that is what has to be addressed against
trolling and especially trolling against women,” said Randeep.
Thumbnail Image Source: instagram/GurMeharKaur & hdimages