Mehwish Hayat seems to be on a roll. After being awarded the Tamgha-i-Imtiaz earlier this year, she’s begun to take her role as an influencer even more seriously which is great!
Earlier this week, Mehwish attended a peace event in Norway where she was awarded Pride of Performance by the Norwegian Prime Minister. During her speech, which went viral, Mehwish spoke at length about the impact of cinema and how Bollywood — being one of the largest film industries in the world — showed Pakistan as a villain and always peddled nationalistic propaganda.
And on Friday (today), CNN published an opinion piece by Mehwish titled ‘The Problem with Priyanka Chopra’ where she talks about how Priyanka — being an international celebrity with a global outreach — has fallen into the same “jingoistic role that her fellow countrymen are forced to adopt at home”.
“Perhaps alarmed by Hollywood’s open opposition to his ally Donald Trump, Indian PM Modi has arguably co-opted and weaponized the country’s film industry. It is difficult, often impossible, for Pakistani actors to find work in India. Pakistan is a Muslim majority nation, and Islamophobia is a top-down industry in India: at the top, hyper-nationalist films, songs and slogans teach the masses to hate. At the grassroots, Muslims have been killed for so-called “crimes,” such as eating beef,” she wrote.
