Rahul Kanwal stoops to another low, says “Vande Mataram is anti-national”, draws flak from social media

Recently, a video clip of Rahul Kanwal surfaced on social media, in which Rahul Kanwal could be seen saying that chanting ‘Vande Mataram’ is an anti-national activity. 

Rahul Kanwal is an Indian TV journalist and News Director at India Today. He hosts prime-time show Newstrack on weekdays. Rahul began his career in 1999 as an anchor-cum-reporter with Zee News and later joined Aaj Tak in 2002.

Now, Rahul Kanwal, the news director of India Today TV, has been accused of believing that chanting Vande Mataram is anti-national. One line was taken from a debate and edited it to make it seem as if the anchor believes chanting Vande Mataram is anti-national is a malicious act. During the debate, even the guest agreed that violence unleashed by lawyers in court was wrong. Rahul was recently in the news for an interview with lawyers where he said that raising the slogan “Vande Mataram” is anti-national activity. 

As the clip went viral, social media was flooded with reaction to his statement. Hordes of netizens slammed Kanwal for his comment. The detractors of Kanwal and India Today TV took a dig at the clip after the news channel did a sting operation that alleged that some members of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) were behind the recent Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) violence.

The ABVP, an affiliate of the Bhartiya Janata Party, cast aspersions on the sting claiming that the students shown in the video were not members of the organization. Since then, a war of words between Kanwal and ABVP/BJP people has been raging on social media platforms.

Writer, historian, and activist Dharam Sikarwar is a very active author The Youth. He writes on national and international issues, environment, politics. He is an avid book reader as well.