Siddharth draws flak for 'sexist' remark to Saina Nehwal; clarifies his position

Tribune Web Desk
Chandigarh, January 10

Tamil actor Siddharth has once again found himself in the middle of a raging controversy.

Siddharth, a vocal critic of the ruling establishment, recently responded to a tweet by Saina Nehwal, India’s star shuttler who’s now a Bharatiya Janata Party leader. Nehwal’s tweet condemned last week’s “security breach” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s convoy in Ferozepur.

Nehwal said in the tweet: “No nation can claim itself to be safe if the security of its own PM gets compromised. I condemn, in the strongest words possible, the cowardly attack on PM Modi by anarchists. #BharatStandsWithModi #PMModi”

 In response, Siddharth said: “Subtle cock champion of the world… Thank God we have protectors of India. Shame on you”—a tweet people took to be “sexist”.

Siddharth later clarified that it was a reference to the English phrase “cock-and-bull”, meaning something that’s made up.

But that mollified neither the Twitterati nor apparently the National Commission for Women, which demanded a report from the Maharashtra Director General of Police.