After Anupam Kher’s tweet on group within fraternity “campaigning for opposition”, here’s what Swara Bhaskar and Soni Razdan had to say

Ahead of the first phase of polling of Lok Sabha Elections 2019, Actor Anupam Kher on Saturday took to Twitter and made an observation about how the people within the Bollywood fraternity were 'campaigning for the opposition'. By Sunday, the actor’s tweet stirred up a storm of reactions from within the film fraternity. 

Kher tweeted: "So some people from my fraternity have issued a letter for public to vote out the present constitutionally elected government in the coming elections. In other words they are officially campaigning for opposition parties. Good!! At least there are no pretensions here. Great. 🙏"

Kher attached a GIF that featured him and a slogan 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai'.

Reacting to the tweet on Sunday morning, Alia Bhatt's mother and actress Soni Razdan replied to Kher’s post saying: "Anupam if you can align yourself to the present Govt why would you think others doing the same is any different ? Just curious"

Anupam clarified his stance and said: "Dearest Soni! It was an observation. Not a complaint.:)"

Soni Razdan in a polite way ended the Twitter conversation by saying 'Acha Ji'.

Here's the interaction between the two -

'Veere Di Wedding' actress Swara Bhasker too left a comment on Kher’s tweet and said: "Yes, it’s called democracy sir :) :) :) ❣❣❣Bharat Mata ki Jai! 🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳"

Replying to Bhasker, Kher tweeted: “Agreed!!! As long as it is not confused with #Intolerance when others use it. Jai Ho and Jai Hind.😍🙏🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳" 

Anupam Kher's tweet comes after news on Thursday broke that 616 theatre personalities, including Naseeruddin Shah, have signed a letter urgent the electorate to "vote BJP and its allies" out of power. The appeal claimed that the idea of India and its constitution were under threat. The letter was issued on 'Artist Unite India website' in 12 different languages namely: English, Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, Marathi, Malayalam, Kannada, Assamese, Telugu, Punjabi, Konkani and Urdu. 

The appeal, along with the names of the signatories, stated that the said the upcoming Lok Sabha elections are the "most critical in the history" of the country.

Watch Arnab’s debate on the issue here

Among those who signed the letter were Naseeruddin Shah, Shanta Gokhale, Mahesh Elkunchwar, Mahesh Dattani, Arundhati Nag, Kirti Jain, Abhishek Majumdar, Konkona Sen Sharma, Ratna Pathak Shah, Lillete Dubey, Mita Vashisth, M K Raina, Makarand Deshpande and Anurag Kashyap.

The appeal by the theatre personalities hasn’t been the lone attempt by the artistic and creative fraternity to urge the electorate to vote the BJP out of power. 

Last week, over 200 writers led by the likes of Arundhati Roy and Romila Thapar wrote an appeal to Indians to vote in favour of “diverse and equal India”  and vote out politics of hate. 

On the 28th of March,  a group of over 100 filmmakers led by the likes of Anand Patwardhan issued a joint statement appealing to the electorate to not vote for the BJP in the 2019 General Elections.

READ | Intolerance Brigade Drops Its Garb, 700 Theatre Artists Including Naseeruddin Shah, Amol Palekar Urge Citizens To Vote Against BJP