Saif calls Sonu’s tweets ‘aggressive’; gets flak
The azaan controversy begun by Sonu Nigam’s (right) tweets just won’t go away. Now, actor Saif
Ali Khan (left) is facing brickbats online for telling the media that Sonu’s tweet was “aggressive”. However, Saif has also said that “amplification of sound comes from insecurity”.
Sonu started an online war last week when he posted against the early morning call for prayer sent out from mosques on loudspeakers. He also called it “forced religiousness”.
In an interview with The Indian Express, Saif said, “It’s fine to express your views on the decibel levels. I think that tweet was a bit aggressive though, initially. And I do think religion should be a private affair and we should be a secular country.” Before that, he said in the interview, “As a minority, you’d like to make your presence felt and hopefully accepted. If someone says that [a practice] should be extinguished, it’ll make some people [a] little uncomfortable. As a precursor to some sort of [a holocaust... it’s the first thing you think of. There’s a bit of fear there.”
Commenters on social media have taken little note of Saif ’s moderate tone. One poster named G Bhatt writes, “Saif Ali Khan who chose the barbaric ‘Taimur’ name for his son out of insecurity fears too? What a sham this idiot.” Another poster, Kusumanjali Singh, writes: “Saif do u hv guts t criticise stonepelter?? Hv u ever condemed the act of stonepelter on our gr8 indian army? So u r condemning sonu’s tweet!”
Asked for a comment, Saif sent us a text: “I don’t like saying something then prattling on about the same thing. Neither do I like being the speaker on all issues.”