New Delhi: Reacting to a tweet she posted in connection with the ongoing Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) sedition row in India, tennis legend Martina Navratilova has cleared her stand on the issue.
She received a lot of flak on Twitter after she posted links of two New York Times articles which were critical of the Indian government over the issue. People said she doesn't have any right to pass judgement on what's happening in India.
In an exclusive column for Hindustan Times, Navratilova said she was only making a point about how violence only makes a situation worse and does nothing to improve it.
“Having grown up under a totalitarian regime in what was a communist country (then Czechoslovakia, now democratic Czech Republic), I am pretty well-versed with what it’s like to live in an authoritarian, unfair system, where one is not at all free to speak one’s mind without serious repercussions,” she said.
“Never did I presume to know the deeper story nor was I trying to tell the Indian people what to do in their own country…”
“I merely suggested that violence and bullying don’t solve anything. I also wanted to say that was true anywhere in the world, but couldn’t fit that in thanks to the 140-character limit Twitter has,” Navratilova said.
What Passes for Sedition in India, -ultra nationalism easily turns into violence at worst, bullying at best. https://t.co/U5V6nvENFn
— Martina Navratilova (@Martina) February 22, 2016
She further added that irrespective of the country, she will continue to raise her voice against injustice.
“And I will keep speaking out when I feel there is unfairness, whether it is happening here in the US, or in Kenya, or in India. Because for me unfairness is at the root of what is wrong with our world, whether it’s coming from the Right or the Left.”
