Twitter India has withheld a tweet put out by self-proclaimed ‘comedian’ Munawar Faruqui that contained cheap sexist remarks targeting national award-winning actress Kangana Ranaut.
On August 23, Munawar Faruqui, who was once arrested for making Hindumisic statements in Indore, put out a tweet saying, “I think Right wing goons got angry because Taslim Ali was selling KANGANA at 2 rupees”. In his tweet, Munawar Faruqui attempted to take sly on the national award-winning actress Kangana Ranaut. However, he ended up making vulgar comments on the actress.
The tweet by the controversial ‘comedian’ was in response to the arrest of 25-years-old bangle seller Tasleem Ali for harassing a minor girl in Indore, Madhya Pradesh. The Indore Police had registered a case against 25-years-old bangle seller Tasleem Ali for inappropriately touching and harassing a 13-year-old girl.
A video had gone viral in which Ali was seen getting trashed by a group of men in the Govind Nagar area, after which Indore Police had filed a case against three main accused and others. Later, it was revealed that Tasleem Ali was selling bangles using a Hindu name and harassed minor Hindu girls. Enraged by this, the residents had thrashed him and also recovered two Aadhaar cards on him, allegedly fake.
The incident had created a massive uproar on the internet, while Islamists and “secular-liberal” attempted to whitewash the crimes of Tasleem Ali by portraying him as a “victim”.
Carrying out similar propaganda, Munawar Faruqui took to Twitter to claim that the right-wing “goons” had thrashed the accused Tasleem Ali for selling ‘KANGANA’ for 2 Rupees. Even though Faruqui’s tweet did not directly name Kangana Ranaut, it was rather evident that his tweet was a cheap sly on the Bollywood actress, given his hatred for the self-made star.
In his hurry to peddle propaganda on Twitter, Faruqui ended up depicted Kangana Ranaut as a saleable commodity and made sexist remarks saying Tasleem Ali sold the Bollywood actress for just two rupees. Indirectly, Munawar Faruqui called Kangana Ranaut a prostitute, however, without directly saying so.
It is important to note that this is not the first time that Munawar Faruqui has been taking cheap potshots at Kangana Ranaut to hog the limelight amidst his dwindling career opportunities. Earlier in January, Munawar Faruqui, after being released from jail over his hate speech against Hindus, had taken pot-shots at actress Kangana Ranaut saying, “Kangana ke tweets padke lag raha hai Fir se Judicial custody chala jaun!”
Well, for Munawar Faruqui’s misfortune, his vile tweet that was passed off as a comedy did not pass Twitter’s scrutiny. The micro-blogging site has removed the tweets put out by Munawar Faruqui targeting Kangana Ranaut, saying it has been withheld in response to a legal demand.
Twitter has decided to withheld the contents posted by Munawar Faruqui after they received notice from authorities. It is not clear yet regarding which authorities demand the removal of vile tweets of Faruqui, however, Twitter has acted this time.
“We may withhold access to certain content in a particular country if we receive a valid and properly scoped request from an authorized entity in that country. We also clearly indicate within the product when content has been withheld,” the Twitter rules stated.
Who is Munawar Faruqui?
‘Comedian’ Munawar Faruqui, who rose to fame by insulting the Hindu victims of the Godhra riots of 2002 and peddling conspiracy theories of RSS involvement in the Gujarat carnage and mocking Hindu deities, was arrested by the Madhya Pradesh police for making indecent remarks about Hindu deities and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
Faruqui and four other persons identified as Edwin Anthony, Prakhar Vyas, Priyam Vyas and Nalin Yadav were arrested for mocking Hindu Gods in a stand-up comedy show in Indore based on the complaint of Eklavya Singh Gaur, an activist and the chief of Hindu Rakshak Sangathan.
They were booked under IPC sections 295-A (outraging religious feelings), 269 (unlawful or negligent act likely to spread the infection of any disease dangerous to life) and other relevant provisions. Section 269 was invoked for allegedly ignoring COVID-19 safety protocol. Faruqui was sent to judicial custody till January 13, which was later extended to January 27.
During a show in April last year, Munawar Faruqui mocked the 2002 Godhra carnage, where 58 Hindus returning from Ayodhya were burnt alive by a Muslim mob. In a part of the clip that had gone viral on social media, one can hear him refer to the carnage as a fictional film “directed” by Amit Shah and ‘produced’ by RSS.
“I was watching The Burning Train on TV. My father came and told me not to watch such nonsense and turned off the channel. I was like, ‘why so?’ He was like, this is the video of Godhra kaand. And this is a news channel. I thought it is a movie directed by Amit Shah, produced by RSS… I don’t know…,” he said. Munawar Faruqui then referred to the news about the 2002 Godhra carnage as “cartoon”.
