What a tragedy India faces today. In the backdrop of farmers’ protests which the Modi government has handled quite shabbily, the twitterati has become its administrative police and carry a say on anything and everything. As a result of that the Modi government and its agencies, face a ‘Hamletian dilemma’ – to do or not to do their duty. Unsurprisingly, all hell broke loose when the Indian Income Tax department officials carried out searches at the premises of noted film Director Anurag Kashyap and actor Tapsee Pannu, on a tip off for tax evasion.
The Income Tax department on March 3 carried out searches at about 30 locations in Mumbai and Pune are part of a tax evasion probe. Both are being questioned by income tax officials.
Searches by the IT department officials also included premises linked to a talent agency as well as Phantom Films, which was co-promoted by Anurag Kashyap, producers Vikas Bahl and Madhu Mantena.
“The Income Tax department probes someone based on whatever information they get. The issue goes to court later,” Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar said during a BJP briefing.
In addition to Kashyap, Pannu & co., the agency managing Saif Ali Khan – Exceed Entertainment and its promoters are also being searched.
Agency managing Deepika Padukone, Kwan Talent Management, is being questioned too.
Tapsee Pannu had in a Machiavellian way attacked Sachin Tendulkar, Lata Mangeshkar, Akshay Kumar, Sunil Shetty, Ajay Devgn and others who spoke against Greta Thunberg, Rihanna and Mia Khalifa’s tweets saying:
“If one tweet rattles your unity, one joke rattles your faith or one show rattles your religious belief, then it’s you who has to work on strengthening your value system not become propaganda teachers for others,” Ms Pannu had said on social media last month.
The opposition parties and their cronies are painting these raids as ‘revenge attack’ by the Modi government.
“The way in which raids were conducted in the homes and offices of Anurag Kashyap and Taapsee Pannu, this is definitely the usage of Enforcement Directorate or the Income Tax against those who take a stand against the government or its policies. Anurag Kashyap and Tapasee Pannu have raised their voice against the Modi government’s policies. This action is an attempt to suppress their voices,” Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik said.
Today the Govt has again made it clear that if anyone speaks against them, then there will be an attempt to suppress it, says @nawabmalikncp on #Bollywood I-T raids. WATCH! pic.twitter.com/kfi6KPviCb
— Mirror Now (@MirrorNow) March 3, 2021
Thus, their thesis is, if you are a criminal involved in illegal activities – tax evasion is illegal – all you have to do is speak against the government of the day and you will be awarded ‘protection’ by the social media warriors. There are millions of them both paid and ‘nothing to do creatures’ – headless chooks – who suddenly have grabbed a smart phone and want to make laws of their own.
But those, who have been elected and committed crimes themselves or are may themselves even be possibly beneficiaries of bad deeds or crimes of their family members, are shameless enough to attack the government for just doing its day to day job.
They first employed IT, CBI, ED to conduct raids on vocal & upright political rivals for their character assassination.
Now Nazi govt is chasing social activists, journalists & artists to threaten them against calling spade a spade.
Condemnable Act! @taapsee @anuragkashyap72
— Tejashwi Yadav (@yadavtejashwi) March 3, 2021
Laloo ‘fodder scam’ Yadav’s son, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav has called the raids a “condemnable act” and slammed the centre.
“They first employed IT, CBI, ED to conduct raids on vocal and upright political rivals for their character assassination. Now Nazi govt is chasing social activists, journalists & artists to threaten them against calling spade a spade,” the Bihar politician tweeted.
As far Tapsee Pannu, Anurag Kashyap and others go, they can rest assured, due process of law will be applied.