‘Kabir Singh’ | Samantha Akkineni hits back at ‘double standards’ accusation after slamming director Sandeep Reddy Vanga's controversial comment

Just like the audiences have been unfazed with criticism for ‘Kabir Singh’, having helped the flick set records at the box office, Sandeep Reddy Vanga is unaffected by it. The director recently justified the 'toxic masculinity’ in the Shahid Kapoor-Kiara Advani starrer by stating that there was no love if one didn’t have the liberty to slap their lover. While the filmmaker got flak from netizens, even celebrities voiced their opposition to his defence. One of them was Samantha Akkineni, who termed Vanga’s quote as ‘deeply disturbing’. However, as netizens accused her of ‘double standards’ by digging up her praise for ‘Arjun Reddy’, the movie on which ‘Kabir Singh’ is based on, the actress hit back that liking the film and condemning the comments were two different things. 

READ: Kabir Singh | 'It's Not Love, If You Can't Slap Each Other,': Director Sandeep Reddy Vanga Faces Netizens' Wrath After The Controversial Statement

In a recent interview with a portal, Vanga had termed the criticism for the film as ‘pseudo’ and ‘bizarre’. He then said that if the lovers don’t have the liberty to slap each other, there was no emotion of love. 

Apart from the Twitteratti, many celebrities like Sona Mohapatra,  Gulshan Devaiah and Atul Kasbekar called him out for his comments. 

Samantha shared a screenshot of his quote on Instagram stories and termed it ‘deeply disturbing.’ 

Later, a Twitter account dug up her 2017 tweet praising ‘Arjun Reddy’ with words like ‘original’ and ‘outstanding’ and posting it alongside her latest post, calling it ‘double standards.’ 

The ‘Eega’ star was quick to point out, “Liking the film .. and disagreeing with a comment are two different things . I loved the story of one ‘Arjun Reddy’ .. not the generalisation that love means having the liberty of slapping people around.”" 

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Nevertheless, ‘Kabir Singh’ is on its way to become the highest-grossing film of this year, earning Rs 225 crore already.