Pramod Sawant calls Kejriwal's remarks on Kashmir Files 'insult to all those who suffered'

Goa Chief Minister-designate Pramod Sawant, on Friday, slammed Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for "mocking and laughing" at a film that depicts the Kashmiri Pandits' genocide. The statement by Sawant comes a day after Delhi CM and AAP national convenor Kejriwal urged makers of the recently released controversial film, The Kashmir Files to put the film on video-on-demand site, YouTube, and denied that the film to be made tax-free for people in Delhi. 

Taking to Twitter, Sawant on March 25, dropped screengrabs of tweets wherein the AAP leader in the past had declared films like Nil Battey Sannata, Saand Ki Aankh as tax-free in Delhi. The BJP leader tweeted, "While Kejriwal's Government in the past waived off tax for several Bollywood films, he refuses to do the same on #KashmirFiles and goes a step ahead by mocking and laughing at the film which brings to light the Kashmiri Hindu Genocide."

"Kejriwal's statement is inhumane and and an insult to those who faced the atrocities at the hands of terrorists in Kashmir," he added.

While lashing out at the BJP for promoting The Kashmir Files and demanding that it be made tax-free in Delhi, CM Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday had said, "Some people were earning crores by" exploiting the suffering of Kashmiri Pandits, while BJP leaders had been "reduced" to putting up posters of the movie.

Kejriwal said in the Delhi Assembly yesterday, "If the BJP wants everyone to watch the movie, filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri should release it on YouTube so that it is available to everyone for free."

Earlier, after attending a special screening of the film which Kejriwal skipped, BJP Delhi Chief Adesh Gupta claimed that the Delhi CM was afraid that a particular community would get angry with him if he watched the film. Terming Kejriwal a 'silent supporter of separatists', Gupta claimed that the AAP chief was not bothered by the massacre of Kashmiri Pandits.

Penned and helmed by Vivek Agnihotri, The Kashmir Files was released in theatres on March 11. The film stars Anupam Kher, Mithun Chakraborty, Pallavi Joshi, Darshan Kumaar among others. It depicts the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits in the 1990s. The film has been made tax free in several states in the country in order to encourage more people to watch it. The Kashmir Files has been declared tax-free in many BJP-ruled states like Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Uttarakhand, UP, Goa and Gujarat. However, it has caught up in controversy with BJP and opposition parties sparring over the portrayal of the incidents it depicts. 

Image: ANI/Twitter/@drpramodsawant/Instagram/@anupampkher