Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 31

Sports Minister Vijay Goel has, yet again, become a huge target on social media, this time due to, as some claim, his insensitivity towards blind cricketers and people.

Goel fooled around with a bat on the stage during an event for the Twenty20 World Cup for the Blind, which began in New Delhi on Sunday. What upset a lot of people was the fact that Goel swung the bat around after blindfolding himself, aping the blind cricketers. As the pictures show, Goel and the people around him on the stage grinned and cheered as if it was a great joke.

Maybe it’s unfair to blame only Goel for this ill-advised attempt at aping blind cricketers, because the two hosts on the stage also had blindfolded themselves. 

But perhaps Goel, being a minister, should have known better. The reaction on social media was brutal — Goel was trolled for being a “modern day Gandhari’. In the ancient epic Mahabharata, Gandhari, the wife of the blind king Dhritarashtra, had blindfolded herself after the two got married. After the photographs of a blindfolded Goel playing cricket were published online, he came in for a lot of criticism, with people accusing him of making “fun of the visually impaired”.

TV anchor Barkha Dutt tweeted: “Er. Really. Is this the most sensitivity we can manage?”

Senior journalist Shekhar Gupta said on Twitter: “In this Lutyens Kingdom of the Political Blind, one blindfolded is the king! Camera-crazy mantris can be foolish. But this is so insensitive. Wrong, dear minister. Pl think again. Big difference between a very sensitively done endorsement advt by cricketers & a minister’s photo-op.” In his defence, Goel tweeted: “I was requested by @blind_cricket officials to play with the players in that way to encourage them... On the request of @blind_cricket, is it a crime to play with them?” 

Source: http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/sport/goel-panned-for-being-insensitive/357995.html