Global celebs jump in! Pressure on Bollywood to take a stand about the ongoing farmers protest?

Rihanna and Greta Thunberg tweeted on the farmers’ protests, but most Indian celebs are still silent

Social media went abuzz late Tuesday night when pop sensation Rihanna shared a tweet about the ongoing farmer protests in India. Hours after, social activist Greta Thunberg also expressed her “solidarity” with the protestors. There has been an outpouring of support from the international community for the farmer protests against the three agricultural laws, including the likes of Indian-origin Canadian talk show host and actor Lilly Singh, singer Jay Sean. While in India celebs like Richa Chadha, Swara Bhasker, Diljit Dosanjh, Sonam Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Harbhajan Singh and some other have come out in support of the farmers’ protest, the biggies have remain rather tight-lipped about the matter. With international celebrities openly talking about it, has this put the Indian stars in the dock and is it time for them to speak up?

Pop superstar Rihanna and climate activist Greta Thunberg tweeted in support of protesting Indian farmers.

Renuka Shahane, Actor-filmmaker

No why should it put them in the dock. It is their personal freedom and it is about personal choice. Nobody is putting a gun on anybody’s head to say something and not say something. People and celebrities in our country will say it when they want to say it. This is a free country and just like everyone else, celebrities also have a right to remain silent when they want to and talk when they want to.

Sushant Singh, Actor

It is too late for a wake up call for celebrities in our country to say anything on the matter. Yes, they should have spoken about it but I guess that is how they are, they have been non-committal on a lot of matter and I am not surprised that they have been on this matter too. I hope some of them do speak up now.

Sona Mohapatra, Singer

I feel anybody who is expressing themselves on any forum & especially those who have the privilege & opportunity to be amplified need to be on top of the facts and figures and understanding of a situation & context. Celebrity virtue signalling & superficial ‘wokeness’ is also a disease of our current times in my opinion. To start with I don’t think Greta Thunberg or Rihanna have any clue about the complexities of policy making, reform or governance in India. So, no, I don’t think it’s important for us to wait for others to join the bandwagon, unless we were doing it for pure fun & entertainment! Those who regularly engage & opining are already doing so & more power to FOE. I haven’t commented up till now because it’s okay not to understand everything!

Gulshan Devaiah, Actor

These kind of things are quite amusing. I think it will put some people off. If you are someone who is in a centrist kind of position this is kind of entertaining also. I don’t know why they tweeted. Sometimes we should look at things bahut door and baahar ke nazron se. I don’t know if people in India should start talking about it.

Onir, Filmmaker

I feel that if they are not woke enough for so long after the death of more than 70 farmers which is the official figure, then I don’t think they would say anything even now, no matter which global celebrities are tweeting about it. Of course they should have a stand but unfortunately they don’t. What surprises me is that how people are like why are these international celebrities talking about our internal matter where as Indian celebrities talk about everything happening in any other country. That is really sad.

Vivek Agnihotri, Filmmaker

These days everything paid, there are no celebs who tweet anything without money. All these international celebs tweeted the same thing, tweeted at the same time you know. They have no idea where India is, Rihanna can’t even tell where India is. So it is not a big deal and it should not be any pressure for anyone in India to say anything.