MUMBAI: An Indian village had to cancel a performance of a traditional Hindu play moments before it was due to start after far-right activists opposed the participation of a Muslim Bollywood star, reports said Friday.
Nawazuddin Siddiqui, best known outside of India for his role in “The Lunchbox,” had been due to perform in a theater production based on the “Ramayana” in his home village of Budhana in Uttar Pradesh state.
But organizers canceled the event after activists from the ultra-nationalist Shiv Sena said they were opposed to a Muslim actor taking part in the Hindu play, according to reports.
“A few members of the Shiv Sena didn’t want a Muslim man to play a character in Ram Leela,” Damodar Prasad Sharma, president of the Ram Leela Committee, told the Indian Express newspaper.
“Then the police told us that we should not let Nawazuddin participate and, if at all we do, and there is a problem during the show, we will have to take responsibility.”
“There were just too many people in the audience, we couldn’t have controlled the crowds in case of a ruckus,” Sharma added.
The Times of India quoted local Shiv Sena official Mukesh Sharma as saying: “In the 50-60 year history of the Budhana Ramleela, no Muslim artist has set foot on the stage. We couldn’t allow that now. It’s about tradition.”
The Press Trust of India said the performance had been canceled while Siddiqui took to Twitter to express his disappointment.
“My childhood dream could not come true, but will definitely be a part of Ramleela next year,” he tweeted late on Thursday.
Supporters of Shiv Sena, which shares power with India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the western state of Maharashtra, is accused of being anti-Muslim and regularly uses intimidation tactics.
Last year activists threw ink over the organizer of the launch in Mumbai of a book by a former Pakistani foreign minister.
It was also accused of using threats to force the cancelation of an appearance in Mumbai by Pakistani singer Ghulam Ali.
Muslim star forced out of Hindu stage play
Muslim star forced out of Hindu stage play
NATO wants ‘automated’ defenses along borders with Russia: German general
- That zone would act as a defensive buffer before any enemy forces advanced into “a sort of hot zone,” said Lowin
- The AI-guided system would reinforce existing NATO weapons and deployed forces, the general said
FRANKFURT: NATO is moving to boost its defenses along European borders with Russia by creating an AI-assisted “automated zone” not reliant on human ground forces, a German general said in comments published Saturday.
That zone would act as a defensive buffer before any enemy forces advanced into “a sort of hot zone” where traditional combat could happen, said General Thomas Lowin, NATO’s deputy chief of staff for operations.
He was speaking to the German Sunday newspaper Welt am Sonntag.
The automated area would have sensors to detect enemy forces and activate defenses such as drones, semi-autonomous combat vehicles, land-based robots, as well as automatic air defenses and anti-missile systems, Lowin said.
He added, however, that any decision to use lethal weapons would “always be under human responsibility.”
The sensors — located “on the ground, in space, in cyberspace and in the air” — would cover an area of several thousand kilometers (miles) and detect enemy movements or deployment of weapons, and inform “all NATO countries in real time,” he said.
The AI-guided system would reinforce existing NATO weapons and deployed forces, the general said.
The German newspaper reported that there were test programs in Poland and Romania trying out the proposed capabilities, and all of NATO should be working to make the system operational by the end of 2027.
NATO’s European members are stepping up preparedness out of concern that Russia — whose economy is on a war footing because of its conflict in Ukraine — could seek to further expand, into EU territory.
Poland is about to sign a contract for “the biggest anti-drone system in Europe,” its defense minister, Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz, told the Gazeta Wyborcza daily.
Kosiniak-Kamysz did not say how much the deal, involving “different types of weaponry,” would cost, nor which consortium would ink the contract at the end of January.
He said it was being made to respond to “an urgent operational demand.”
