Cricketers Irfan Pathan and Manoj Tiwary on Thursday (February 4) grabbed the headlines by taking a subtle dig at several current and former India players, who started tweeting in response to the international icons for lending their support to the ongoing farmers' protest in India.
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The issue really blew up after pop singer Rihanna and climate activist Greta Thunberg shared an article about the farmer protest on Twitter. While Rihanna captioned "Are we talking about this?", Thunberg stated she was in solidarity with the farmers.
In response to the outrage, many Indian cricketers such as the legendary Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane, Anil Kumble, Suresh Raina among others, tweeted that outsiders shouldn’t be commenting on the internal matters of India.
They also used the hashtags #IndiaTogether and #IndiaAgainstPropaganda in their posts.
Subsequently, Pathan shared a cryptic tweet, highlighting that Indians had also raised their voices when George Floyd was brutally killed by the police in USA last year.
“When George Floyd was brutally murdered in the USA by a policeman, our country rightly expressed our grief. #justsaying,” wrote the former all-rounder, who represented India in 29 Tests, 120 ODIs and 24 T20Is.
On the other hand, out-of-favour batsman Tiwary termed them as mere puppets acting on the directions of the government.
“When I was a kid, I never saw a puppet show. It took me 35 years to see one,” he tweeted.
