Television news channel Times Now issued a statement distancing itself from the controversial remarks made by Kangana Ranaut about the freedom struggle in India during an event organised by the channel. The channel has expressed this statement two days after Kangana’s remark, after which people are strongly criticizing it.
In fact, during an interview given to news channel Times Now, Kangana had said that the freedom we got was alms. The real freedom came in the year 2014. After this statement of Kangana, there was an uproar and people started criticizing her strongly. Opposition parties, including the Congress, criticized both Kangana and the channel for this statement. Some BJP leaders had also come out against this statement and called it an insult to the freedom fighters. Fearing reprisals, Times Now issued two clarifications distancing itself from Kangana’s outrageous comments insulting freedom fighters.
Times Now first tweeted, “The question asked was about Savarkar, but the response was on a different matter. Navika Kumar then followed up with a question about whether Kangana was expressing her loyalty to the BJP, and Kangana responded by saying she’s a patriot. Here’s the complete viral sequence.”
However, contrary to claims made by Times Now, Navika had not challenged the controversial entertainer after she said India achieved its real independence in 2014 when Narendra Modi became the prime minister.
Realising that this could backfire for the channel, Times Now posted a second tweet condemning Kangana’s comments outright. It tweeted, “#KanganaRanaut may think India got Independence in 2014 but this cannot be endorsed by any true Indian. This is an insult to millions of freedom fighters who gave up their lives so that present generations can live a life of self-respect & dignity as free citizens of a democracy.”