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Lawyer Files Sedition Case Against Kannada Actor-Politician Ramya For 'Pakistan Is Not Hell' Comment

The court will hear the case on 27 August.
Actor Ramya attends a press conference in Dubai in 2007. (Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images)
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Actor Ramya attends a press conference in Dubai in 2007. (Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images)

Kannada actor-turned-politician Ramya, also known as Divya Spandana, is being trolled for her alleged remark that "Pakistan is not hell" since the past couple of days, The Times of India reported. Apart from abusive messages from the public, Ramya has been reprimanded by Jaggesh, another Kannada actor-cum-politician.

Speaking at an event organised by Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) to protest against anti-nationalism, Jaggesh, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), said, "People who have not studied and don't have any experience are praising Pakistan. They should be given a peace prize, maybe a Nobel. They should also be allowed to stand next to Bill Clinton and take photos."

Not quite done, Jaggesh added that those supporting anti-national sentiments are "mosquitoes and bedbugs" and should be destroyed with poison.

Ramya, however, took the negative reactions to her statement, including Jaggesh's, in her own stride.

To photographs of people defacing her image or baying for her blood, she reacted with a quote from the Gita:

Ramya, a member of the Congress Party, made the remark on Pakistan while addressing a women's rally in the Mandya constituency, near Mysore, to which she was elected in 2013 in a by-election but lost the seat in the 2014 general elections. She has recently come back from Islamabad, after attending the SAARC Young Parliamentarians Conference 2016.

This is not the first time Jaggesh and Ramya have exchanged heated words. The two had a bitter quarrel earlier when Ramya walked out of Jaggesh's movie Neer Dosalast year.

In 2014, after Ramya lost her seat from Mandya, Jaggesh had accused her of opportunism. "People who degrade cinema after winning election, but say they will act after losing it are opportunistic," he had tweeted.

His reference was to his fellow actor dropping out of Neer Dosa after she won the by-poll, leaving the crew of the movie in a lurch. Ramya had countered the accusation by saying, "I have always maintained that I will not be able to take up new projects, but will definitely finish those I have already committed to." She was later replaced by actor Hariprriya in the movie.

Update: A complaint was filed against Ramya by a lawyer under several sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), including 124-A (sedition), in Kodagu, Karnataka, according to ANI. The court will hear the case on 27 August.

According to reports, Ramya has said she will not apologise as she has done nothing wrong. "I don't have an ego at all and in any given incident, I would have apologised, but if I do in this case, the larger cause we're fighting for would go," she said. "I respectfully disagree, Pakistan is not hell, people there are just like us," she added, referring to Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar's remark that going to hell and going to Pakistan were the same.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.