Free speech and the voice of opinion is the most battled entity in our nation. Out of all the battles, there have been times when a discussion helped nobody, instead turned us deaf from all the noise it produced. While the bandwagon is all accommodating, Bollywood out of all the industries is targeted the most.
Although the criticism (courtesy- the watchful media) never stops, the foul play in all of those is still debatable. Remember the time, after Meryl Streep‘s award-winning speech, when Twitterati won’t stop asking Bollywood to grow a spine? To lend their voice to matters of national importance?
Well, that and instances of the same nature have provoked Bollywood superstar, Shah Rukh Khan to give all, a piece of his mind. In an interview with a leading daily, the ‘Raees’ star has condemned the Indian media and it’s act of guardianship.
King Khan was quoted as saying,
“I found it very odd that all the journalists started saying “when will Indian actors start speaking like this?” Why would Indian actors speak about a situation that does not exist? I would like to turn around and ask: Why don’t journalists here behave the way their counterparts do in the West? You see journalists asking pointed questions to presidential candidates fearlessly and with facts. Here, I want to tell the journalists that it is not your time, so can you please keep quiet. Can I listen to those two people you are asking questions to? Now, there are two journalists on the TV screen and both are talking over each other and the panellists, sitting there, are not talking. It is a strange space…”
The silver jubilee star came down hard at journalists asking them to ‘get over their wonderful, newly-gained stardom’.
Shahrukh Khan also added,
“Like I have said before, journalists are not used to stardom — theirs as well as celebrities. Suddenly, everybody looks better, does better make-up and the anchor is the star of every show. The editor is the star of every snippet. Everybody writes an article with a picture. Everybody is trying to lose weight, look nice. When I was seven years into stardom, I used to behave like this. I am waiting for media persons to get over their wonderful, newly-gained stardom. I am friends with most of them and really want to ask them: Why do you want to join the bandwagon of faceless people on social media who just want to say a thing and become famous? Give me a platform where you present my point of view, not as part of the agenda you have in your storyline. I would speak — I always did, I always will. People start questioning why Shah Rukh Khan is not speaking. If something is not affecting me or I have no knowledge about it, I am allowed to remain silent.”
SRK even addressed the short-sighted scrutiny he was subjected, of playing Muslim characters consecutively saying, “You may write a piece from the point of view that I am doing three back-to-back Muslim characters. With due respect to my professionalism as an actor, I did not even know what my name was in Karan Johar’s Ae Dil Hai Mushkil. I just went for two hours, did some shots and had fun with my friends, Karan, Ranbir (Kapoor) and Aishwarya (Rai Bachchan).”
After all the ruckus that went down after Shah Rukh voiced his sentiments about ‘anti-tolerance’ in India, we can understand where his wrath coming from right now! Just wish, it doesn’t create more furor for him.
