Goa Chief Minister-designate Pramod Sawant and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Friday criticised Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for ‘mocking and laughing’ at a film that highlights the genocide of Kashmiri Hindus.
The statements a day after Kejriwal urged makers of the film ‘The Kashmir Files’ to put the film on YouTube and denied the film to be made tax-free for people in Delhi.
In a thread of tweets, Sawant shared screenshots of tweets wherein Kejriwal in the past had declared movies like Nil Battey Sannata, Saand Ki Aankh as tax-free in Delhi.
“While Kejriwal’s Government in the past waived off tax for several Bollywood films, he refuses to do the same on #KashmirFiles and goes a step ahead by mocking and laughing at the film which brings to light the Kashmiri Hindu Genocide,” tweeted the BJP leader.
Sawant added, “Kejriwal’s statement is inhumane & and an insult to those who faced the atrocities at the hands of terrorists in Kashmir.”
Sarma tweeted: “If you don’t want to make #KashmirFiles tax-free, don’t. But stop this constant mocking of Kashmiri Pandits. Their sufferings are a result of such condescending attitudes and appeasement politics of secularists. It doesn’t behove a CM to use the Assembly to rub salt in the wounds of Hindus.”
Slamming the BJP for promoting ‘The Kashmir Files’ and demanding that it be made tax-free in Delhi, Kejriwal on Thursday said, “Some people were earning crores” by exploiting the suffering of Kashmiri Pandits, while BJP leaders had been “reduced” to putting up posters of the movie.
“If the BJP wants everyone to watch the movie, filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri should release it on YouTube so that it is available to everyone for free,” Kejriwal said in the Delhi Assembly yesterday.
The Vivek-Agnihotri directed ‘Kashmir Files’ that was released in theatres on March 11 stars Anupam Kher, Mithun Chakraborty, Pallavi Joshi, Darshan Kumaar and others. It revolves around the killings of Kashmiri Pandits in the 1990s. The movie, which has been made tax free in several states in the country has caught up in controversy with BJP and Opposition parties sparring over the portrayal of the incidents it depicts.