Maharashtra govt to probe celebrities, cricketers tweet on farm law

New Delhi, Feb 08: The Uddhav Thackeray-led Maharashtra government has decided to probe celebrities, including Bharat Ratna recipients such as cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar and singer Lata Mangeshkar, who had tweeted in support of the Centre on farm laws.

"It has been revealed that there were same posts by celebrities at the same time, hence it will be investigated why it has happened", said Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Desmukh.

Echoing similar sentiment, Congress had demanded a probe by the police into the tweets posted by celebrities to counter the global criticism of the government's handling of the farmers' protest.

"There was a series of tweets after MEA's response to Rihanna's tweet. If a person, be it a celebrity, opine on their own, it's fine but there's a scope of suspicion that BJP could be behind this. We have cited common words like 'amicable' in these tweets", said Congress leader Sachin Sawant.

"You may have seen what kind of pressure is there on the media, how a politician is threatened with ED or CBI probe if he/she speaks against the BJP. We have all seen this.

"As far as your objection (about celebrities'' tweets) is concerned, we will definitely probe into those. Our intelligence agency will probe it," Deshmukh assured.

Later, in a tweet, Deshmukh said during the video conference, Sawant discussed this "serious issue" with him. "Despite being infected by COVID-19, I gave him time because this issue is related to farmers. I heard him out and assured to take action as per rules in this connection," the minister said.

Meanwhile, addressing reporters here, Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole on Monday accused the central government of pressurising celebrities, "like the underworld" once used to do.

He also asked celebrities to not fall prey to such alleged pressure tactics because they are youth icons.

Patole said there was a time when the underworld used to pressurise celebrities to behave in a certain way.

But, the Narendra Modi-led government is using celebrities to divert attention from the issues concerning farmers, the poor, unemployed and small industrialists, he alleged.

"The BJP government is doing what the underworld used to do," Patole charged, saying it is not a matter of pride for the country.

Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg and several people from the international community had come out in support of the farmers protesting against the Centre''s new agriculture laws.

Thousands of farmers, mostly from Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, have been protesting at Delhi''s borders for over two months against the laws.