Hate Speech: Twitter Suspends Bollywood Actress Kangana Ranaut’s Account
LAHORE MIRROR (Monitoring Desk)– Twitter has suspended the account of contentious Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut over a tweet that allegedly incited violence.
In it, she asks Prime Minister Narendra Modi to “tame” an opposition leader using his leadership style of the “early 2000s” – a likely reference to rioting on his watch, which left over 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, dead.
Ranaut’s tweet immediately drew outraged reactions on the platform.
Twitter has not made a statement yet.
But a company representative told BBC News Ranaut had repeatedly violated the platform’s rules on hate speech and abusive behaviour.
Speaking to the ANI news agency, Ranuat responded by accusing Twitter of racism.
“I have many platforms I can use to raise my voice, including my own art in the form of cinema saying,” she added.
Ranaut is no stranger to controversy. An industry outsider, she initially won praise for raising the issue of nepotism in Bollywood. But she soon became a polarising figure both within the film industry and outside of it. She has often used public platforms like Twitter and Instagram to make unsubstantiated accusations or launch scathing attacks on colleagues and celebrities.
She called actress Sonam Kapoor a “mafia bimbo”, Urmila Matondkar “a soft-porn star” and mocked Deepika Padukonne, who has spoken of her battle with depression.
Her tweets have not just been controversial but also, at times, insensitive or just bewildering.
She tweeted lamenting about the oxygen that was being “forcefully drawn from the environment” as breathless Indians died due to a shortage of oxygen. She declared to the world in February that she displays a “range” that “no other actress on this globe has right now”, adding her “raw talent” matched Meryl Streep and her skill at action was as good as Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot’s.
SOURCE: BBC NEWS
