Cong Leader Calls Kangana "Nachaniya." Can Disagreement Ever Justify Sexism?

For all of 2021, Kangana Ranaut was never out of the headlines. Keeping up with the consistency of landing herself in a soup, although she may not be looking at her run-ins with controversy as trouble, the award-winning actor is ending the year with a big bang.

Some comments she recently made - about India getting independence from the British in "bheek" and only finding true freedom in 2014, the year Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power - have sparked nationwide debate, splitting reactions down the middle. While many hail her for her "nationalistic" views, others are demanding her arrest and that she return the Padma Shri she received not too long before she made the bheek remark before an audience for the television. More on that here.

But Ranaut is not one to sit out on a contentious issue, least of all one that revolves around her. In the absence of a Twitter account, which was permanently suspended in May this year after a controversial tweet, Ranaut took to Instagram stories and appeared to take a direct shot at Mahatma Gandhi. Among the many statements she made was one that said ahimsa - Gandhi's prominent peaceful protest belief - was "not how one gets Aazadi, one can only get bheekh like that."

While she sits stirring the pot, her ideas continue to evoke passionate reactions online and off. An especially aggressive and regressive one came from Congress leader Vijay Wadettiwar who called Ranaut a "nachaniya" - a woman who dances professionally and is a term heavy with derogatory connotations.

"She's not worthy to make a comment on Mahatma Gandhi. She's a 'nachaniya', considered one of the controversial people," Wadettiwar

She's not worthy to make a comment on Mahatma Gandhi. She's a 'nachaniya', considered one of the controversial people. Her comment on Mahatma Gandhi is like spitting on the sun. If you spit at the sun, the spit falls back on you: Maharashtra Min Vijay Wadettiwar on Kangana Ranaut pic.twitter.com/vpgJuBDzjH

She's not worthy to make a comment on Mahatma Gandhi. She's a 'nachaniya', considered one of the controversial people. Her comment on Mahatma Gandhi is like spitting on the sun. If you spit at the sun, the spit falls back on you: Maharashtra Min Vijay Wadettiwar on Kangana Ranaut pic.twitter.com/vpgJuBDzjH

— ANI (@ANI) November 17, 2021

Kangana Ranaut Nachaniya Remark: Here's What's Wrong With It

It is clear which context Wadettiwar used nachaniya for Ranaut in. Though the word isn't essentially offensive, it was projected in a way that appears to be hardly anything but. That the thoughts of a naachne-gaane wali (also something Ranaut has previously been called dismissively) don't matter. That she can never be accorded "worthiness" enough to speak on issues like politics considered graver and more significant than her business of entertainment. That her position is inferior and insignificant.

The sexism is vivid. Precisely as it was when Ranaut herself attempted to insult actor Urmila Matondkar by calling her a "soft porn star" in the midst of an ongoing public spat between them last year. Read more here.

In politics, misogynistic tendencies such as this aren't uncommon, especially against those who don't hold offices and belong to "soft power" industries like cinema. Actor Deepika Padukone, for her eyeball-grabbing Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) visit during campus violence in January last year, was told by a BJP leader that "heroines should be in Mumbai and dance."

Ranaut, of late, has become a polarising figure with outspoken ideas that many would not agree with. Her remarks about freedom fighters and bheek may be considered inflammatory but they are hers. And in a free country, she has a right to them, no matter how much or little support it garners. Disagreement with her too is justified. But can or should sexism be?

Views expressed are the author's own.

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