Vishwa Hindu Parishad spokesperson Vinod Bansal Friday lodged a complaint with the Delhi Police and Mumbai Police against Twitter India for allowing Iranian-Canadian author and podcaster Armin Navabi to post derogatory comments on Hindu Goddess Kali.
In his complaint, Bansal hit out at officials of the social media platform for allowing the post, and not taking action against the concerned account holder. In his tweet, he tagged External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani along with a copy of the complaint.
Armin-Navabi
“We request you to book officials of Twitter India for allowing such posts and not taking action against such account holders. Also, Twitter MUST have a policy of filtering the messages which are against a region and a state,” the complaint read.
The VHP leader alleged the intent of the post by Navabi was to “incite and provoke Hindus, break peace-harmony and create unrest in the society”.
“The image he has posted is published on Twitter, a social media platform and hence the officers of Twitter are equally liable for punishment of the above-mentioned provisions,” he wrote in the complaint.
On Thursday, Navabi had posted the picture of Goddess Kali and written: “Okay! I’m in love with Hinduism. I never knew you had sexy goddesses like these. Why would anyone pick any other religion?”.
His post triggered several reactions on the microblogging site, including from actor Kangana Ranaut‘s official Twitter handle. Navabi subsequently posted responses to the reactions, saying, “How is ‘sexy’ an insult?”
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I have travelled through Iran twice overland and as British Indian never come across the type of religious bigotry this Canadian Iranian has displayed. It is right that Twitter should ban his posts and his account should be flooded with protest comments. For him to respond in the manner he did is like using similar comments on other female figures in major religions. However the Western and even Indian media is not interested as long as the narrative is maintained and Hindus feel victimized at the behest of major Abrahamic faiths