An open letter to Abhijeet Bhattacharya: How about calming down a bit, sir?

Dear Abhijeet Bhattacharya,

Greetings from a fan who once cherished your voice and now feels bad about it. Now that you’ve vented so much of nationalism on social media, hope you’re feeling better about it.

I remember watching a singing reality show on television show during my school days, where you’d appear as one of the judges. We would laugh over how you relentlessly fought with your fellow judge, another renowned female playback singer from Bollywood. But you know? Those days were better. Like many, I also believed your anger and aggression were scripted, fabricated; something that is reality shows are said to have done. But well!

Remember the day Salman Khan was set free from all allegations of the 2002 Hit-n-run case? You took to Twitter and wrote, ‘kutta road pe soyega, kutte ki maut marega, roads garib ke baap ki nahi hai.” Irrespective of whether you supported the verdict or not (which is entirely your choice), you effortlessly referred to few dead souls as dogs. You justified that being poor is a crime. Being homeless is a crime. And if one shelter-less person sleeps on the road, he deserves to be smashed by a car and die. Your compassion towards Salman Khan did not shock us, your insensitivity did.

Oh wait, if only this compassion lasted forever! Khan recently opened up on banning Pakistani artistes and stated that banning could be no solution for dealing with terrorism. This really pissed you, right? You suddenly realized that Salman was ‘promoting’ terrorism and still roaming free. Ever heard of anything called ‘personal opinion’, sir?

Okay, let us shift our attention to your remarks on Karan Johar and Fawad Khan. Do not like Fawad Khan? Great. Do not want to watch ‘Ae Dil Hai Mushkil’? Great. Do not even want it to release? Not great, but okay. Instead of engaging in a discussion or putting across your stand in a healthy manner, you chose to take dig on his sexuality indirectly. Know what, sir? Standing in 2016, being one of the world’s fastest developing nations, we are NOT supposed to be wondering about one’s sexuality. If you think you dodged us, you’re wrong. Your statement ‘Bollywood is frustrated with frustrated gays’ was clearly directed at Johar and everybody got it. How uglier could it get?

We wish you stopped there, but you did not. You kept exceeding every limit of decency and wrote, “Another #lovejihad .. Mehbooba #KaranJohar is in depression ..pak lover fawad ditched bechari Mrs @karanjohar khan.”

This was not only a desperate slap on one’s dignity, but also a dig on Karan’s recent revelation where he said he dealt with depression. We wouldn’t even try to explain to you, that depression is not something to be made of. Millions of people across the globe suffer from it and if there’s a bigger problem than the disorder itself, then it is insensitive antipathetic minds like you who find it a rejoicing act to make fun of people’s sufferings. And we don’t even want to look twice on that tweet where you wrote, “Fawad left and said talaq talaq talaq to #KaranJohar”.

Leave decency and sensitivity. If not for you, we would never believe an artist could (or would) refer to the population of an entire country as ‘bastards’. This comes at a time, when the laymen of both countries are sick of being fed all the hatred.

Here’s a free tip, sir. Calm down. The entire country condemns Uri attack and mourns the death of brave soldiers. We want this to stop. We want a world where peaceful co-existence is not an utopia. And! We expect our artists to be kind in attitude, controlled in their expression and respectful to other individuals. Why not identify the real problems, real culprits? All the hatred is going to bring you more hatred.

If the letter doesn’t make sense to you, ignore like you’ve ignored all trolls, always.

Best wishes,

A hopelessly hopeful fan.

Ranjini Maitra

Journalist. Writer. Reader. Enthu cutlet. Mood-swing machine. Day dreamer. Sandwiched between ‘live life fully’ and ‘lose some weight’. Mantra of life: Love and love more.