The umbrella body of the protesting farmers’ unions has acknowledged the international support towards its protest with pride even as the ministry of external affairs dismissed their tweets terming them as “neither accurate nor responsible”.
A Twitter storm was kicked up on Tuesday after Americal pop singer Rihanna shares a CNN article on farmers protests and wrote, “Why aren’t we talking about this?” Swedish activist Greta Thunberg too extended her support as she wrote, “We stand in solidarity with the #farmersprotest in India.”
The tweets met strong reaction from Indian Twitter users. Claims and counter-claims were made over how international celebrities have been roped in. As the international influencers have a massive following on Twitter, it soon snowballed into a Twitter storm, prompting the ministry of external affairs to issue a statement.
The farmers’ leaders, on the other hand, are happy over international acknowledgement. Samyukta Kisan Morcha’s Darshan Pal said it was a matter of pride that international personalities have shown sensitivity towards the cause of farmers. “On the other hand, it is unfortunate that the government is not understanding the pain of the farmers and some people are even calling peaceful farmers as terrorists,” he said.
