New Delhi: Union Minister Smriti Irani on Friday accused the Left of orchestrating the JNU violence.
She took to Twitter and said: “Left design in JNU unmasked. They led mobs of mayhem, destroyed public property paid for by taxpayers, disallowed new students from being enrolled, used the campus as a political battleground. #LeftBehindJNUViolence becomes public knowledge as @DelhiPolice releases evidence.”
Earlier she came down hard on Bollywood actress Deepika Padukone for mingling with the pro-Left students lobby at JNU.
Deepika Padukone had visited the JNU campus late on Tuesday and stood in solidarity with JNUSU president Aishe Ghosh and others who had been assaulted by masked men who were allegedly ABVP activists.
On Thursday, Smriti Irani speaking at a function in Chennai, questioned Deepika’s motives in standing in solidarity with the pro-Left JNUSU leaders and ignoring the ABVP activists who had also complained of being assaulted earlier.
“She knew that she is standing with people who beat other girls at their private parts with lathis who don’t see eye to eye with them ideologically,” the Minister said.
“She stood next to them, that is her right. I can’t deny her that right. She made her political affiliation known in 2011 that she supports the Congress party,” the Union Minister declared and went on to add,
“It’s her right (to) stand next to people who say Bharat tere tukde honge…It was a shock for people who admired her and watched all her films but did not know (about her political affiliation).
“It was not a shock for me. I think the vibrance of the democracy that we are in depends upon that… we live with so many people who say so many things. We live in a democracy where communists want to come to power through democratic process. It is an oxymoron (sic).”