On Thursday morning, a picture of a green bus bearing the name “Democracy Travels”, with a photo of Mohammad Ali Jinnah, was posted on social media.
The seemingly harmless bus, however, triggered the rage of many right-wing activists and residents to such an extent, that a man named Abhishek Singh called for people to “lynch the owner inside the bus and burn it”.
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Following this, Hindu nationalists and right-wing activists took to Twitter and Facebook, condemning the owner of the bus with some strongly-worded status messages.
“If anyone wants to support our enemy country, they can just leave and settle out there. OR IS IT THE OPPOSITION PARTIES' DIRTY POLITICS JUST TO OUST MODIJI FROM POWER?? But these pictures hurt the hearts of millions people living here,” The Nationalist, a right-wing Facebook group, posted.
What Was the Bus with Jinnah's Photo Doing in Bengaluru?
Neeraj Kamath, the former core committee member of NaMo Brigade, was the first one to spot the bus.
After the picture went viral on the social media, it was revealed that a private travel agency in the city had rented the bus for the shooting of the Malayalam film Aabhaasam. The film was being shot in Bengaluru.
According to a report by The Times of India, the filmmakers hadn’t put up a board conveying that the bus was meant for the movie shooting. It further said that when Neeraj Kamath contacted the film director Jubith Namradth, he stood his ground and refused to take down Jinnah’s picture.
However, Kamath later tweeted that the owner of the bus, fearing public backlash, had taken down the picture from the bus.
(The story was first published on The News Minute.)
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