It’s been five days since Salman Khan’s infamous comment that trivialised rape. Social media has been obviously outraged and everyone’s fuming at his insensitive statement, but not Bollywood. Most of tinsel town has carefully chosen to stay mum about the whole situation.

There have been a fair few from the film fraternity who have come out and spoken up against Salman. The likes of Anurag Kashyap, Kangana Ranaut, Sonali Bendre and even Lisa Ray have voiced their thoughts. 

Sona Mohapatra was even trolled mercilessly with morphed pornographic images and even sent rape threats for tweeting about the incident. And while all of this was happening, Salman Khan continued to smirk away, without the slightest hint of an apology! 

 

While we’re not too happy about it, we’re not really surprised that most of Bollywood chose to turn a deaf ear on Salman’s comment. We don’t expect anything else from them.

But some people we do expect to step forward and show their support for women. Some people we thought would raise their voice against this outright desensitisation of a grave topic. Because some people have always spoken about speaking up against the injustices faced by women. About being Men Against Rape And Discrimination. 

Some people, like Farhan Akhtar!

 

 

So what happened, Farhan? How did the words dry up when the time came to stand up and speak up?

When the industry’s favourite brat casually shrugged off his rape comment by saying, ‘the shorter I keep it, the better’, at the IIFA 2016, standing with him were Shahid Kapoor, Deepika Padukone, Priyanka Chopra, Sonakshi Sinha and you, Farhan. 

In fact, you were standing right next to him at the event, shoulder to shoulder. With not the slightest hint of disgust, you just kept standing there, next to your Bhai. Smiling for the cameras, getting along with the person who demeaned rape. 

masala

Why were you sweeping it under the rug, instead of speaking up like you keep saying that we must? 

 

Dear Farhan, what happened to being the MARD? 

What happened to all those songs, ballads and poems about supporting a woman? For standing up for her when no one else would? What happened to all those videos you made, commented on and showed your support for? What about the song you just sang on Women’s Day, celebrating equality? 

‘We all are on the good side‘, isn’t that what you sang? What happened to MARD?

 

Need I remind you that you’re the official Male Goodwill Ambassador to the UN for Women in South Asia. 

We have always respected you for your courage. For always saying and doing the right thing. When you were made the ambassador for women in South Asia, we rejoiced because they couldn’t have chosen a better person for a role like this. 

But if you won’t say something about influential people like Salman Khan trivialising rape, who else will? But your MARD did not stand up this time. Not a tweet. Not a comment on the issue. Nada.

We went to the theatres and watched your movies just for you, sang all your songs, waving our hands to the beat, and stood by you when you harped on about women’s rights, about celebrating womanhood. And when the time came for you to practice what you preached, you chose instead to stand next to the guilty party and smile and pose for the cameras.

You could’ve said something and even if you chose not to (which by the way is downright hypocritical), the least you could’ve done was at least not be seen with him.

Or maybe, you could have asked him politely, to apologise for his thoughtless comment. Your words won’t move us the same way anymore, because what truth is there in the hollow words when you fail to act them out?

Has rape become a joke any Tom, Dick or Harry can make because Bhai did so and didn’t feel the need to apologise or even show remorse? 

Have you accepted it as a joke too? If not, then stand up now before it’s too late, before rape is reduced to just a laughing matter.