Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan has said that people have been overreacting about intolerance in India, because it has been happening for a long time. In conversation with The Indian Express‘s Deputy Editor Seema Chishti at the ‘Express Adda’ discussion meet in Mumbai, Khan said, “It’s nothing new. The voices that you hear, I think, because of social media have become easy to hear but they have always been there.”
Speaking on the changing political scenario in the country, Khan agreed that right-winged politics was more rampant now. However, he said, “Things are changing. Everything is becoming a little more right-wing. But that’s not happening only in India, it’s happening across the world.”
Narrating an incident with an Italian filmmaker, he said, “We started chatting. After a few minutes he said, ‘Oh! You are a Muslim?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ he replied, “Don’t tell anyone!” I kind of smiled and thought that this is the prevalent attitude now. I feel it less in my own country than in some places abroad.”
Strangely enough, given that he faced criticsm from fans for naming his son Taimur – a name similar to the Turco-Mongol conqueror Timur – Saif Ali Khan said that intolerance was less in India than in Western countries.
Read: Saif Ali Khan Wanted To Change Son’s Name In Wake Of Controversy
“We are still developing and finding our identity… Everything can’’t be judged by the same standard. We have modernised due to television and fashion coming in but in our thinking we are still years behind the west. They also went through their times of insane nationalism. They finally came out of it and look more sorted today. So, maybe we also need to go through this. Maybe, we need to stir things up. People need to express their opinions and then get into trouble for that. And one day eventually, find a level. And we are doing that right now,” he said.