There was a time when international celebrities mostly raised concerns about racism and women’s empowerment and the regions in focus were the US, Middle East, and Africa.
No more so, it’s now Rihanna, an International pop sensation Rihanna who surprised her Indian fans when she tweeted in support of farmers.
The farmers, who have been protesting at multiple points in Delhi borders for more than three months now seem to have grabbed the attention of international celebrities too. Often government has resorted to internet censorship to mute the protestors.
India tops the list of countries that restricted internet access in the world when internet access has been declared a human right by the UN.
Taking to Twitter, Rihanna questioned the internet ban imposed in Haryana and some parts of Delhi and thereby extended her support to farmers.
However, she perhaps was more surprised that no-one is raising concern about Internet restriction in a democracy like India. It is extremely rare in western world to restrict internet access during a protest.
Protests like Black lives matter and even violent siege like on Copitol Hill did not result in internet restrictions.
Rihanna’s tweet has quite naturally created a lot of internet stir in India, given how polarized the nation has become on the issue of farmers’ protests, and beyond. Many people put their reactions to the tweet known to the public.
As usual, came the queen of controversy Kangna. She perhaps has been given too much attention in recent times despite her insensitive tweets and false rants on Twitter– including those during the death of Sushant Singh Rajput.
She earlier had called the death a murder without any proof, called the entire Bollywood fraternity the gutter of drugs, exploitation, nepotism, and jihad.
Yes, her Twitter account still exists (while many journalists and farmer leaders have been restricted) and she keeps ranting about every event in India as if she were an expert. In lines with her pro-government stand, she replied to Rihanna’s tweet and called the protesting farmers “terrorists”.
However, several people are calling it a paid tweet, and others are simply laughing at this implication
As expected some Indians believe that farmer protests where hundreds of thousands of individuals are protesting for over three months now are all part of some wider conspiracy.
Earlier the CAA protests against the new citizenship bill were surprisingly quelled in a similar manner. This time some people went overboard and called it a paid tweet.
Because we were busy condemning this unlike doing paid tweets. pic.twitter.com/l417rQrxjL
— CA Chota Don (@choga_don) February 2, 2021
Poor farmers can afford Rihanna too
Many had their own way of laughing off the irony of responses that stated this was a paid tweet. Rihanna is in Forbes’ 2020 list of richest self-made women.
In the decade since her first single was released, Rihanna has worked tirelessly on both her music and her philanthropy.
Though she is now a household name, she has consistently made it a point to connect with her fans and her roots and lead her voice to global issues and give back to the global community.
For the unversed, the government in Haryana has banned internet services in 14 out of 22 districts. While the ban was first for 24 hours, it has now been extended until Feb 2. Many areas in Ghaziabad and Noida faced internet restriction in the aftermath of Republic Day Violence on 26th Jan.
