Please don t call our players illiterate: Goel responds to Akhtar

New Delhi March 1 (IANS) Bollywood lyricist Javed Akhtar on Wednesday drew sharp criticism from Sports Minister Vijay Goel for calling India s sportstars illiterate in his tweet in support of Delhi University student Gurmehar Kaur.

Calling the sportspersons India s pride Goel took to Twitter to respond to Akhtar which read: Please don t call our players illiterate. You re a champion in your field and they are champions in their own field. India is proud of them!

Earlier Akhtar had voiced support for Gurmehar who is in the eye of a storm over her stance against student outfit Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and a video campaign advocating peace between India and Pakistan.

Akhtar s comments came in the wake of Gurmehar facing criticism from noted sportspersons like cricketer Virender Sehwag and Olympic medallist wrestler Yogeshwar Dutt.

If a hardly literate player or a wrestler troll a pacifist daughter of a martyr its understandable but whats wrong with some educated folks. Akhtar wrote.

Kaur is the daughter of Captain Mandeep Singh who was killed in a militant attack in Jammu and Kashmir s Kupwara district on August 6 1999 four days after Pakistani troops withdrew from Kargil.

--IANS
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