Congress unit in Kerala screens controversial BBC documentary
Thiruvananthapuram:
The Congress unit in Kerala is screening the controversial BBC documentary on PM Narendra Modi in Thiruvananthapuram today, even as the central government has banned it in India calling it false and motivated “propaganda”.
The public performance of the two-part series – which speaks about the 2002 Gujarat riots and PM Modi’s politics, among other things – is one of many such events organized by several opposition parties and free-speech activists across the country . The Congress is also in opposition in Kerala, but the ruling CPM has also taken a stand against banning the documentary.
In Kerala, the documentary is also at the center of a controversy within the Congress as Anil K Antony, son of veteran leader AK Antony, recently quit the party alleging “intolerable calls to retract a tweet” in which he criticized the Congress. The stance was rejected and the BBC documentary was called out. A “dangerous precedent”.
Responding to Anil Antony’s argument that it undermines India’s sovereignty, senior Congress leader and Lok Sabha member from Thiruvananthapuram Shashi Tharoor said his argument was “immature”.
,[Are] Is our national security and sovereignty too fragile to be affected by a documentary?” Mr. Tharoor said.
Today’s screening at Shangumugam Beach in Kerala’s capital Thiruvananthapuram comes in quick succession of such protests in Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, and one after the other by Congress students’ union NSUI in Chandigarh.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi while talking to reporters in Jammu raised the question of censorship. He said, “Truth shines. It has a bad habit of coming out. So no amount of restrictions, repression and intimidation will stop the truth from coming out.”