Appeal to Jamia alumnus Shah Rukh Khan to speak up on varsity violence

Mumbai, Dec 17: RJ-actor Roshan Abbas and writer Aatish Taseer appealed to Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan, an alumnus of the Jamia Millia Islamia University, to offer support to the students of his varsity against the police action amid protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act.

Many from the film fraternity including actors Mohammad Zeeshan Ayyub, Parineeti Chopra, Sidharth Malhotra, veteran screenwriter Javed Akhtar, filmmakers Vishal Bhardwaj and Anurag Kashyap, and Hollywood actor John Cusack expressed solidarity with the youth over Sunday's violence inside the campus.

Many on social media also questioned the silence of the other Khans -- Salman and Aamir -- and Bollywood heavyweights like actors Amitabh Bachchan, Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh, Ranbir Kapoor, filmmakers Karan Johar and Ekta Kapoor on Jamia violence which triggered nationwide protests against the contentious Act.

Thousands of students across India took to the streets demanding a probe into the use of teargas inside the Jamia library as well as police entering the campus without permission from university authorities on Sunday. Jamia turned into a war zone on Sunday as police entered the campus and used force to quell student protests against the Act.

Abbas on Tuesday questioned Khan's silence over the police crackdown on the varsity students. A Hansraj College graduate, the 54-year-old actor studied for a master's degree in Mass Communications at Jamia, but left to pursue his acting career.

"Say something @iamsrk you are from Jamia too. Who has made you so quiet? #IStandWithJamiaMilliaStudents," Abbas tweeted.

The British-born Taseer, whose Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) status was recently revoked by the Indian government, said the absence of Khan's voice from the film fraternity expressing solidarity with the Jamia students was "terrifying".

"It's a scandal that @iamsrk has not offered one word of support to his Alma Mater. Since we know that you're not out of sympathy with them, we have to conclude that you're terrified of this government, which should be terrifying for the rest of us," Taseer tweeted on Monday.

According to the amended act, members of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian communities, who had come from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan till December 31, 2014, and were facing religious persecution, will not be treated as illegal immigrants but given Indian citizenship.