When I came out, they smeared my entire body with black oil paint, shouted slogans and said “we had ordered you to cancel the program, you didn’t listen to us, this is what we’ll do”.
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“They abused me”, Kulkarni alleged and said that his Observer and Research Foundation (ORF), a foreign policy think-tank, will hold Kasuri’s book launch as planned here later today.
In response Devendra Fadnavis, Maharashtra chief minister, had yesterday assured “total security” for the event.
Kulkarni had met Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray at the latter’s residence “Matoshree” late Sunday night, but left without getting any assurance from him. The Shiv Sena has opposed the event, claiming Kasuri was responsible for the Kargil War and he should not be given a platform in India to launch his book.
The writers said they were also protesting the government’s failure to condemn the lynching last month of a Muslim man suspected of eating beef.
Indian police are being sent to secure the dispatch of a book by a previous Pakistan outside pastor in Mumbai after a conservative association said it would upset the occasion. Scheduled for release today at 5:30 pm, the event turned controversial when Sudheendra Kulkarni, who was to moderate the discussion about the book, was made the target of an attack.
Raut said Kasuri had accompanied senior BJP leader L. K. Advani to the tomb of Pakistan’s founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah a few years ago.
Filmmaker Bhatt said the attack makes one wonder about India’s democratic status.
“This morning, I saw on TV my long-time colleague Sudheendra Kulkarni has been attacked”.
Shiv Sena, however, defended the action with party MP Sanjay Raut terming it as a “very mild form” of protest. “We have submitted all of that to the CM and we now expect him to keep his word of not allowing any anti-India stand and intervene and stop the programme”, he said.
Black ink was sprayed on the technocrat-turned-columnist for not bowing to Shiv Sena’s diktat calling for cancellation of the event over its Pakistan connection.
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Kasuri arrived for the launch at Nehru Centre this evening, flanked by organiser Sudheendra Kulkarni. “Modi model is not #MakeInIndia but breaking in India & pillars r competitive communalism, intolerance & misogyny and casteism (sic)”, tweeted CPI(M) leader Brinda Karat.
