Kangana pokes liberals; Takes on cow vigilantism

Actor Kangana Ranaut on Wednesday described lynchings in the name of cows as “wrong” and “a sad state of affair” in the country while stressing on the need to protect the animal. Her comments came during an interaction with Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev in Mumbai. There have been several incidents of lynching in the country on suspicions of either cow smuggling or consuming beef, the latest one being in Alwar in Rajasthan last month when a man from Haryana was killed. The outrage over the killing snowballed after controversial BJP MLA from Alwar, Gyan Dev Ahuja asked Rajasthan Home Minister Gulab Chand Kataria to register a case of cow smuggling against the victim Rakbar Khan and his associate Aslam Khan. “You feel conflicted. You want to save the animals but when the lynching happens, you feel heartbroken at what's going on. You feel this is wrong,” Kangana said when asked about lynchings..To drive home her point, the outspoken actor brought in latest movie “Manikarnika” into the discussion. “I'm working on a martyr's biopic 'Manikarnika' where there is a scene where my protagonist, Laxmibai, goes and saves a calf. My crew had a discussion, we halted the shoot. They said 'we can't save a calf' because we don't want to look like cow savers,” she said. “When such a prejudice thrives, as a person you feel very protective of who you are and what your values are, and you want to save all animals and you definitely want to save the cows because the prejudice is really agonising. But (then) lynching for cows takes place and you look like an idiot,” she added. Lynch mobs were not the only ones in Kangana's line of fire. She also took on liberals, claiming that they only accept people “in their group” if “you hate the same person they do”. “And then you jump to the other side which has always criticised and they never want to be protecting cows and these people look sensible, these so-called 'liberals'. Liberals, by definition, are people who have acceptance for other people and opinions, but these liberals will not take you into their group unless you hate the same people as they do.”