Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh has instructed Mumbai Police to take legal action against stand-up comedian Agrima Joshua for her remarks on Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj.
Taking to Twitter, Deshmukh wrote, "I ve instructed CP Mumbai and IG Cyber to take legal action expeditiously ..I urge everyone to maintain calm and law will take its course."
Earlier, Joshua's old video, in which she cracked jokes on Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's upcoming statue in the Arabian Sea, surfaced on the internet. The video went viral and she was slammed for "hurting sentiments" of the followers of the Maratha king.
Shiv Sena MLA Pratap Sarnaik on Friday had demanded the arrest of the stand-up comedian for her comments. In a letter to Deshmukh, he had demanded strict legal action against Joshua.
He also posted a video and said, "I saw the video and I feel she doesn't have respect for Shivaji Maharaj or she doesn't know about him. He also warned that if she was using Shivaji Maharaj's name to earn money, the Maharashtra Yuvati Sena/Mahila Aghadi will not tolerate it. "If you need, you can take information about Maharaj from Shiv Bhakts. The Hindutvavadi Janata will not tolerate it," he said.
However, Joshua on Friday evening had apologized for hurting the sentiments of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's followers and said that video was taken down. "I am sorry for having hurt the sentiments of the many followers of the great leader Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. My heartfelt apologies to followers of the great leader, who I sincerely respect. The video has already been taken down. Please amplify," she tweeted.
In the one minute seven seconds video that went viral, Joshua is seen cracking jokes on Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's upcoming statue in the Arabian Sea. She goes on to tell "funny things" that she read on Quora. Someone on the question-and-answer website wrote, "This Shivaji statue is an amazing masterstroke by Prime Minister Modi Ji. It will have solar cells which will power all of Maharashtra," Joshua said.
She further said, "Another person posted 'It will also have GPS tracker and it will shoot laser rays out of its eyes to shoot Pakistani terrorists in the Arabian sea.' The third person came and said 'Get your facts correct. It's not Shivaji. It's Shivaji Maharaj.'"
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