KANHAIYA KUMAR FACES STIFF OPPOSITION AT LUCKNOW LIT FEST
LUCKNOW: Former president of JNU students’ union Kanhaiya Kumar faced stiff opposition at the Lucknow Literary Festival on Friday where he was invited for a discussion on his book ‘Bihar to Tihar’. As soon as Kumar reached the venue at Sheroes Hangout, Gomti Nagar, at around 7pm, activists of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad started manhandling him. They also raised slogans against Kumar. BJP MP from Bihar, Shatrughan Sinha, who was also a guest at the event, was caught in the pandemonium. The Bollywood actor, however, stepped aside.
LUCKNOW : Former president of JNU students’ union Kanhaiya Kumar faced stiff opposition at the Lucknow Literary Festival on Friday where he was invited for a discussion on his book ‘Bihar to Tihar’. As soon as Kumar reached the venue at Sheroes Hangout, Gomti Nagar, at around 7pm, activists of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad started manhandling him. They also raised slogans against Kumar.
BJP MP from Bihar, Shatrughan Sinha, who was also a guest at the event, was caught in the pandemonium. The Bollywood actor, however, stepped aside.
After much effort, Kumar was escorted to the stage but the agitators continued their protest and demanded that Kumar should not be allowed to speak at the event.
The protest and counter protest by supporters of Kumar created chaos and cops from the Gomti Nagar police station reached the venue to control the situation. When the situation turned out of control, staff mem- bers of Sheroes Hangout, a cafe, who are acid attack victims, pleaded with the agitators to end the protest.
For about 45 minutes, chaos prevailed but later cops persuaded the agitators to leave the venue. In the highly charged -up atmosphere, the audience also took pro and anti- Kanhaiya Kumar stance. Some questioned his presence at the literary fest while others came out in his support. When the event resumed, Kanhaiya Kumar said: “I have been to several literary festivals. But nowhere did I face such an opposition.”
Aziz Qureshi, former governor of Uttarakhand, who arrived at the event, refused to share the stage with Kanhaiya Kumar and sat in the front row. After Kumar’s session, actor –turned politician, BJP MP from Patna Sahib, Bihar, took over the stage . For a change, ‘shotgun’ (Sinha’s nickname) was also praise for PM Modi. “I respect Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Some of his policies are very good. In a family, members disagree over certain issues and the same is the case with me,” said Sinha.