The National Commission for Women (NCW) on Monday issued a notice to actor Vivek Oberoi demanding explanation over a “misogynistic” tweet on exit polls.
The NCW in its notice to the actor said that he has made “made insulting and misogynistic post on Twitter carrying picture of a minor girl and a woman”.
Taking suo moto cognisance in the matter, the NCW said, “It has been reported that you had drawn a sly comparison between the poll result and a woman’s personal life.”
“Post made is extremely offensive, unethical and shows disrespect towards the dignity and respect of women in general,” the NCW notice added.
Commenting on the matter, NCW chairperson Rekha Sharma said, “We would like him (Vivek Oberoi) to apologise on social media and personally also to the person concerned. If he doesn’t do, we will see what legal action can we take against him. We will be talking to Twitter to remove that tweet immediately.”
Reports say that Maharashtra State Commission for Woman, too, is mulling to take action against Oberoi for his objectionable tweet.
Earlier today, the actor shared a meme on Twitter to express his happiness regarding the exit poll results for Lok Sabha elections 2019.
The meme compared three stages of election results – opinion poll, exit poll and final verdict – with a combination of three photographs featuring Oberoi and his one-time rumoured girlfriend Aishwarya Rai Bachchan.
While one image shows her and Salman Khan with ‘Opinion Poll’ written on it, just below it is a photograph of Oberoi himself with Aishwarya, with the caption reading ‘exit poll’.
The final photograph with ‘Result’ written on it shows the former Miss World with her husband, Abhishek Bachchan, and their daughter Aradhya.
“Haha! creative! No politics here….just life,” Oberoi captioned the meme and also credited another Twitter user from where he sourced the meme.
But Twitter users did not find the meme funny from any angle. Among those who slammed Oberoi were badminton star Jwala Gutta and politician Dhananjay Munde among others.
Highly Disgusting !
— Aarti (@aartic02) May 20, 2019
Cheap joke. In very bad taste Vivek, especially dragging a child in to this
— Manak Gupta (@manakgupta) May 20, 2019
At least this man should have thought 10,000 times before dragging a minor into it.. Shame on you Mr @vivekoberoi #VivekOberoi
— Kamlesh Sutar (@kamleshsutar) May 20, 2019
How cheap a person can b … @vivekoberoi thinks after his film on #Modi he is reincarnation of #Modi
Look at the level of disrespect for women @SalmanKhanHolic don’t u think he has crossed limits @SrBachchan it’s disrespect to any women— Dr.Jitendra Awhad (@Awhadspeaks) May 20, 2019
Dude wtf is wrong with you?
— Ishita Yadav (@IshitaYadav) May 20, 2019
Extremely absurd of you to tweet this!! Disappointing!
— Gutta Jwala (@Guttajwala) May 20, 2019
Get over it. This meme isn’t about you and you know it well. Your disguised and sly attempt of popularizing this crass graphic on aishwarya can only fool some dumb folks here. Jerk!
— shilpi tewari (@shilpitewari) May 20, 2019
Brother with all due respect…. this is not Good, delete it ryt now…. I have been ur supporter but this is Bad…Genuinely Bad…
— Rohit Jaiswal (@rohitjswl01) May 20, 2019
@vivekoberoi it’s not the creativity, it’s reflection of your degraded mentality.#shameonyou #respectwomen @LoksattaLive @abpmajhatv @zee24taasnews @News18lokmat @bbcnewsmarathi @SakalMediaNews
— Dhananjay Munde (@dhananjay_munde) May 20, 2019
Oberoi had not deleted the tweet at the time of writing.