BJP leader calls Shah Rukh Khan ‘traitor’ after KKR gets Bangladeshi player Mustafizur Rahman for IPL: ‘He has no right to live in India’

Shah Rukh Khan is the co-owner of IPL's Kolkata Knight Riders team. (Credit: Facebook/@srkuniverse)

Launching a scathing attack on Shah Rukh Khan, Uttar Pradesh BJP leader and former Sardhana MLA Sangeet Singh Som called the Bollywood superstar a “gaddar (traitor)” for getting Bangladeshi fast bowler Mustafizur Rahman for his Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) team in the upcoming edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL). He went one step further and even claimed that SRK had no right to continue living in India. For the unversed, the KKR franchise is owned by SRK, actor Juhi Chawla and her husband Jay Mehta.

“On one hand, Hindus are being killed in Bangladesh, and on the other hand, cricketers are being bought in the IPL auction. Shah Rukh Khan bought Rahman by spending Rs 9 crore. Today, anti-India slogans are raised in Bangladesh, the Prime Minister is abused, but traitors like Shah Rukh Khan are helping them by spending nine crores. They have no right to live in this country,” Sangeet Som said during a public event in Meerut. Threatening Mustafizur with dire consequences if he arrives in India to play in the IPL, Sangeet said he wouldn’t be allowed to even step out of the airport.

Speaking to news agency PTI later, he noted, “Hindus are tortured and massacred in Bangladesh. Their houses are being torn down, and they are beaten to death. Our sisters and daughters are being raped. Hindus are being killed one after another. Even after all this, if you are getting a player from that country, this is a treachery against India. And people like Shah Rukh Khan are traitors who support Pakistan and Bangladesh from time to time. They only support those countries that torture Hindus. These gaddar log (traitors) don’t keep in mind that the people of India made you the Shah Rukh Khan that you are today.” SRK is yet to respond to these comments.

The Bollywood superstar’s move also drew sharp criticism from people like Jagadguru Swami Rambhadracharya, Devkinandan Thakur, and Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Anand Dubey. However, Congress MP Manickam Tagore condemned the “gaddar” remarks against the Bollywood superstar, dubbing it an “attack on India’s pluralism.” He wrote on X (formerly Twitter), “Calling Superstar Shah Rukh Khan a ‘traitor’ is an attack on India’s pluralism. Hate cannot define nationalism. RSS must stop poisoning society.”

The debate over whether or not to pick players from countries with which India has tensions has been ongoing for quite some time. According to Live Mint, Pakistani players have been banned from playing in the IPL since 2009 following the Mumbai terror attacks. In 2010, SRK commented on this, opining that Pakistani players should have been chosen in the IPL auction. “I think it’s actually humiliating to me as a KKR owner that this has happened. We are known to be good, we are known to invite everyone, and we should have. And if there were any issues, they should have been put out earlier so that everything could happen respectfully,” he told NDTV.

SRK added, “There is going to be a section of people who have suddenly gotten up and have said, rightly or wrongly, ‘ Australians will not be allowed to play’. So here is a set of people who are spending up to Rs 70, 80, 90 crore on trying to win a tournament and suddenly, even if you say this much to me, I’m like ‘uh-oh, so should I take or shouldn’t I take him?'”